{Kurt}

The smell of curry spices, butter and garlic filled the dining room as Kurt took Jon's hand on one side, and Mel's on the other for Pete to say the grace. Jon's mom looked like she'd spent the day in bed; her damp hair was up in a messy greying mom-bun and her face was bare of makeup. Kurt thought she smiled as much as usual; she had laughed when he spun to show off for her, making his skirt float around him as if he were a flower as colourful as the print on the fabric.

Helping himself to butter chicken and naan bread, he passed the food and watched Jon's family take turns telling their stories from their week, keeping an eye on Jon's dad out of habit. In his experience, the man at the head of the table had the most power to turn the tone of this whole meal; at the Klassen family table Kurt and his mother had worked in tandem to keep his father pleased and jolly. Sometimes Kurt had to manage both of his high-spirited parents alone; his mother had a temper of her own.

That wasn't his job here, but he couldn't help being alert to Pete in particular. He also kept quiet; in Jon's family home, he was acutely aware that he didn't belong and was the person most likely to disturb the peace of this table.

When it was Jon's turn to share, his boyfriend slung an arm back over his chair, his hands closing loosely into fists. "My news this week is I'm taking a break from school in January."

There were noises of surprise and curiosity, and Jon smiled at his mom and dad. "You all called it last year in December--it's not worth burning out to finish my degree so quickly. I'll admit it--I'm a slow learner when it comes to my own limits."

His free hand touched Kurt's, lying on the table. "But I have a partner now, and he deserves more than the leftovers of my energy at the end of the day." Jon glanced sideways at him, his eyes smiling. "We're going to figure out something more sustainable."

Kurt smiled back; the word 'partner' in Jon's mouth soothed the ache in his heart.

"Also, if it's not obvious--" Jon lifted his chin to look at his family around the table. "Kurt and I are--" Mel gasped softly, her face lighting up, Jon paused with a rueful laugh, probably realizing what she hoped he was about to say. "Um, we're a permanent thing. I'm taking your advice, Dad, to shift my priorities to make space for that to..." Jon opened his free hand like a flower, inexplicably blushing bright pink.

Bea gave a little squeal, pressing her knuckles against her grinning mouth. Tabitha May huffed a sigh, then began to scroll on her phone under the edge of the table.

Cary said, "So when are we eating gluten-free wedding cake?"

Jon exchanged a look with Kurt.

"We're not doing that," Kurt said, while Jon bent his head and toyed with his fingers. "We would, but it puts Jon's work at risk."

Jon's dad sat back in his chair, tossing his napkin beside his plate. Kurt watched him warily, having difficulty reading his expression through his beard.

"Well I'm disappointed," Pete said. "Here I've been looking forward to putting my collar back on and blessing my son's gay marriage. You were my best hope, Kurt."

Impulsively, Kurt made his eyes wide and innocent, putting his chin in his hand. "I did wonder what you would say, Pa White, if I came asking for Jon's hand. Along with the rest of his adorable body." With everyone watching, it felt safe to make this small jab at Pete and Kurt figured he could pick up the truth of Pete's answer whatever the other man said for the family dinner table.

What he did not expect was for Jon's dad to well up, tears spilling over his eyes and running down into his beard. The table got quiet as Jon's dad thumbed the tears out of his eyes and caught his breath.

When he finally spoke, Pete's voice was hoarse and unsteady. "I would have been so honoured, Kurt. If you had come to ask my blessing to marry Jon." He laughed a little through his tears. "He doesn't need my permission--he'll do what he thinks is right and always has. But I know many parents who no longer have relationships with their adult children. I have never wanted to be that father, whatever choices my children make. Sometimes, though, our children go their own way, no matter how we hold our arms open to them." Pete lifted his chin, his lips trembling. "I feared sometimes..."

"Dad," Jon protested softly. He met Pete's eyes, shaking his head once. "I love you."

Pete smiled at his son, and then turned the light of that look on Kurt. "We don't need a wedding to welcome you into our family, Kurt. It's obvious to us how important you are to Jon and how good you are together. I'm just...beyond glad to have you at our table."

Mel took Pete's hand, smiling up at Kurt, her eyes also full. "That goes for both of us. Oh..." She laughed softly, swiping tears out of her eyes. "This is the happiest day I've had in a long time."

Kurt ducked his stinging face, overwhelmed. Pete and Mel's frank emotion had caught him off guard.

Jon steered the conversation away from Kurt, his hand gripping Kurt's firmly. "Can you still do a marriage, dad?" he asked.

Pete made a scoffing noise. "I still have my collar in a drawer and I can bless whomever I want to bless." He crinkled his eyes in a smile. "What are they going to do--take my credentials away? I gave those back years ago. No strings on me, son."

Tabitha excused herself, making a polite smile that somehow skipped over Kurt. He couldn't have cared less.

After acknowledging his daughter with a smile in return, Pete went on, "What is true is I can't perform a legal wedding ceremony without those denominational credentials. When I realized I couldn't perform your wedding with them, Jon, they didn't seem much good to me anymore. You would have to see a justice of the peace to do the legal side and then I could do a blessing ceremony in your church."

Kurt's eyebrows lifted hopefully and he glanced at Jon. Jon's mouth tucked in on one corner and he shook his head once. "You'll just have to bless us around the table, Dad, like you do every week at family dinner. That's enough for us."

As dinner wound down, Kurt longed to get out of the crowded room into the crisp, cold night and just get some time to process. Jon was helping his dad wash the dishes when Kurt nudged Cary' arm. "Coming skating with us, Cary?"

Bea's face lit up. "You're going skating?"

"Uh...no," Cary said gruffly. "This two hundred fifty pound body does not get up on skates."

"Pretty please?" Kurt asked. "The river is frozen solid and gorgeous this time of year. I need a chaperone to take my person on a skating date."

Cary sighed as he rubbed his bad hip, clearly torn.

Bea hurried to her dad, tugging his arm. "Daddy, can we go skating? The gays need us to chaperone."

"Sure I will, Honey Bee," Pete said. He glanced at Kurt, crinkling his eyes in a smile. "That all right with you, Kurt?"

Well, what could he say except yes?

{Jon}

As they drove into the river valley and parked beside the cozy skating lodge on the bank of the North Saskatchewan, Jon felt his partner recovering his usual good spirits. It wasn't lost on him that his dad made Kurt uncomfortable, and he knew enough about Kurt's own family to guess at the reasons why. It was a small thing for him to take a stand for Kurt's status at the White family dinner table and he was touched and grateful for his parent's warm response. He was looking forward to the day that Kurt was his joyful, expressive self in his parent's home the way he was everywhere else.

Kurt practically skipped across the snowy parking lot with their skates in his gloved hands. "Oh my god I've been looking forward to this all day." He tipped his face up to the clear, ink black sky above the river flooded with light. "Winter sports make me feel more alive. It's probably the Viking in me."

Jon was trying to remember the last time he'd been skating. Hopefully he wasn't going to fall on his face and look like an idiot.

There was a small crowd of people in the lodge, parents and children, couples and groups of twenty-somethings walking over the rubber mats in their skates to help themselves to the concession. The smell of damp winter woollens and buttered popcorn was inescapable. Kurt had left his skirt in the car with some noticeable reluctance; he laced up his skates with flying fingers like he'd done it a thousand times before, finishing while Jon was still tugging at his laces.

Kurt took a knee in front of him, quickly pulling the tongue straight on Jon's boot and finishing the job with expert speed.

"I don't need help, Visser," Jon said, exasperated, but he leaned back and let Kurt do his other skate.

Kurt shot him a grin under the stripes of his knitted hat. "I'm in a hurry to get on the ice, White, and you're slow!"

Further down the bench, Pete was doing the same for the pink and yellow laces on Bea's second-hand hockey skates. Together they clomped down to the river, Bea's ankles wobbling even as she exclaimed over the beautiful setting.

The whole icy curve of the river was cleared of snow, making a grey-green figure-8 loop around a pair of small islands striped with a handful of evergreens. Far out on the ice, couples skated arm-in-arm, their legs stroking in time, while closer to the lodge harassed parents tried to keep their bundled children upright on their skates.

When Kurt glided onto the ice, flipping to skate backwards and grin at them, Jon was instantly envious. High school gym had included a skating unit and he was a passable skater, but Kurt moved effortlessly, like his skates were just an extension of his body.

Bea was tipsy on her skates and Pete tucked her hand into his arm to steady her as they set out for a turn around the river. Catching up with Kurt, Jon wished he could take his arm too. He bumped their shoulders together instead, smiling at his partner. "You look like you were born on skates."

Kurt's mouth curled, pleased, as his feet dropped into time with Jon's. "Practically was. Ma Klassen had us up on skates before we could walk. Backyard rink was a winter staple at our place. And we all did our time in hockey--mom loves hockey. Wins the prize for loudest cheering hockey mom every year."

Jon laughed. "Is there a prize?"

Kurt's grin widened, turning to skate backwards while he watched Jon. "I made sure there was. You're not terrible yourself, White."

"How are you doing that?" Jon asked, watching Kurt's feet.

The ice surface in the shadow of the farthest island was abandoned and when they turned the corner and left the crowd behind Kurt took his hand, spinning Jon around laughing as the snowy banks flashed by. He caught Jon's wrists, pushing him backwards and coaching him on how to move his feet. It was like dancing, finding the groove with Kurt's body to sway and lift his skates in rhythm.

Bea tottered around the corner. "Hey, there you are!" she called.

Kurt let one of Jon's wrists go, clasping his mittened hand for a minute as they skated towards Bea, their feet still in sync.

"Your brother's getting skating lessons," Kurt said. "Looks like you need some too, Honey Bee." And he carved a circle around her before taking her wrists and drawing her forward as he skated backwards.

"Oop!" Bea said, wobbling and catching herself, laughing.

Pete joined them and took Jon's arm like he was eight years old again. Jon let himself fall into comfortable rhythm with his dad, happy to say nothing as they made a loop onto the busier surface in front of the lodge.

"Thanks for what you said to Kurt today," Jon said finally. "That means a lot to me."

Pete glanced at him, smiling in his beard. "You seem very happy, son."

Jon ducked his head as he smiled, his whole body warming in a blush. "Yeah I am," he said. His eyes picked out Kurt's colourful hat and scarf above his lanky black-clad form, twirling Bea under his arm.

"It does my heart good to see you caring for someone so deeply," Pete said. "It's one of God's best gifts."

"Feels like that to me too," Jon said quietly. "Like I've been given a gift. I didn't expect this and I would never have admitted I needed it. But Kurt makes me better. In a way I couldn't have got to on my own."

After a moment of quiet, Jon asked, "How's mom?"

Pete sighed, leaning his shoulder briefly against Jon's. "This is a difficult time of year for her, as you know. But she's carrying on with her work at the school, which is good to see. She's just tired when she comes home. She doesn't have--extra. For us right now. But--" he lifted his shoulders, making a smile in his beard. "--Christmas is coming. And having Kurt at our holiday gatherings will be a real pick-me-up for her. She's been fretting about how to keep him, and you laid those worries to rest for her tonight."

Jon blinked, wrinkling his stinging nose. "Good," he said softly. It hadn't occurred to him that the gift of Kurt to him might also become a gift to his mom, and that expanded in his chest until his ribs ached. He worried about his mom more than he would ever admit to anyone.

Feeling the weight of the week ahead pressing close, Jon resisted looking at that directly. There was no way to know if he had it in him to make it through; this night was practically perfect and that was enough. They were all just going to have to hunker down to survive the darkness of this time of year, hoping to find each other again on the other side.

{Kurt}

Kurt should have slept like a baby after spending hours in the wintry outdoors, so when he startled awake in the middle of the night at first he couldn't figure out why. Beside him, Jon's body twitched and his partner whimpered something too soft for Kurt to hear.

He lifted his head to check Jon's face in the dim light of his nightlamp, worried a migraine had come on in the night. Jon was spread on his back with his hands over his head as usual, but his fingers were making tiny jerking movements like he was trying to close them into fists. As Kurt watched, Jon sucked in a breath and a sound came out of his mouth like someone screaming under water.

All the hairs on the back of Kurt's neck lifted and he shook Jon's shoulder, hard. "Jon, wake up."

Jon gasped and Kurt ducked as Jon's arms came down, fists tight, covering his face and neck.

"Love--you just had a bad dream," Kurt's voice cracked and he didn't dare put his hands on Jon now until he was sure his boyfriend was completely awake and aware of where he was. "You're safe."

In a second Jon had rolled up and nearly thrown himself out of bed, just catching himself with a fist in the fabric wall hanging beside them. He perched there, his ribs heaving as he blinked at Kurt's nightlamp.

"You okay?" Kurt asked.

Jon looked back, his hair rumpled over his milk-white face and eyes dark with pupil. Nodding once, he pushed out of the tent.

Kurt fell back on his pillows, pushing his hands against his pounding heart. Everything about that had been terrifying. In all the months they'd shared a bed, Jon had always slept like a rock.

He heard the water running, and then Jon padded back into his room, sliding under the covers without looking at him. Kurt could hear his shivering and reached for him, sliding close to fit Jon into the warm spoon of his body. The other man sighed and pulled his shirt over his face, dropping back asleep without saying a word. Kurt hummed a little comforting hum to himself. At least that was normal for Jon. He fell asleep soon after with Jon in his arms.

*These chapters (apart from this cliffhanger of a nightmare) were a lovely break for the guys - and me! - kind of like the moments in The Hobbit when everyone's feasting with the elves and making poetry before they have to venture out into the wilds again to be hungry and rained on and eaten alive by midges.

What do you think about the pacing - do you find scenes like the dinner and skating party boring and skippable? Or do you feel they serve a purpose in the story?

How did you feel about Pete and Mel's response to Jon's announcement that he and Curt are a permanent thing? Did you understand what Pete said about his denominational credentials? As a former ordained minister, I'm completely familiar with the language but not sure if it communicates to anyone unfamiliar with the church.

Thanks for the reads and votes, lovelies! I feel like Jon, that we are just hunkered down through this COVID winter, making it through the darkness day by day. I hope this story is a little spot of light along the way for you, the way it is for me.*

2962 words.