Media: Fic
Title: wouldn't trade a day
Rating: G
Spoilers: None.
Warnings: None
Word Count: 818
Summary: Blaine and Kale go food-shopping.
AN: Part of the Follow You Down 'verse. Kale sort of grabbed a hold on me and wouldn’t let go? XD Hope you all enjoy! Also, Kale in this story? This was me every time my mother took me grocery shopping… I was kind of a brat. Title comes, inexplicable, from Sugarland's "Everyday America."
Kale doesn’t like shopping carts. They’re hard and cold and uncomfortable and besides he’s a big boy. He is five. Only little kids still ride in the cart. Clearly, his papa did not get the message.
“Papaaaa,” Kale whines, straining and twisting. “Papa, let me out.”
“No can do, champ,” Blaine replies, eyes fixed on the shelves, searching for the right brand. “You’ll take off like a bat outta hell and I won’t be able to catch you and then you’ll be lost and you’ll go home with some nice elderly couple who always wanted grandkids and they’ll love you and cuddle you so much that their cat will get jealous and eat you in the middle of the night.” He shoots Kale a smile and ruffles his mass of light brown hair.
Kale, however, is not amused. He crosses his arms, brow sinking lower over his eyes. “Cats can’t eat people,” he mutters in response to his papa’s wild tale.
“That’s what you think, but are you really willing to test it out?”
In lieu of a reply to that, Kale just matches his papa’s eyes and kicks his heels against the cart’s metal barring deliberately. The clangs echo noisily throughout the aisle and several other shoppers glance up. Blaine meets his son’s gaze and has a brief debate over his options. After only a moment - and Kale speeding up the tempo of his kicks - he fits his hands underneath the boy’s arms and hefts him out of the cart. Setting him on the floor, Blaine sighs and shakes his head. “How come you don’t give Daddy trouble when you go shopping with him, hmm?”
Kale shrugs, giggling happily from his victory. He bounces on the balls of his feet a minute, enjoying the ability to move and stretch while Blaine sets a few items into the cart. When it’s time to move on, Blaine keeps one hand on the handle of the cart and swings the other one down to grab at Kale’s hand. The little boy holds his papa’s hand easily, grinning wide as he does. Kale has to skitter-step with little hopping motions as Blaine’s legs are too long for their paces to match up. They finally stop in front of the rows of pasta boxes and Kale’s mind wanders. After a moment, he beams up at his papa and jostles their joined hands to get his attention. “Papa,” he drawls, when Blaine doesn’t immediately turn from the boxes of pasta to him. He rocks back on his heels, letting all his weight drag tension into his papa’s arm. “Papaaaaaaaaa.”
Blaine finally looks down then, with a half-exasperated, half-amused look. “What can I help you with, demon-child?”
Kale giggles and sets himself completely upright again. “Can we get ice cream?”
Blaine nods, back to examining the spaghetti. “Yes, but last. Remember? Frozen stuff is right before we leave so it doesn’t melt.”
Kale pulls a face at the prospect of waiting all that time, watching as Blaine drops the selected pasta into the cart. He hops a few steps along with Blaine as they round to the next aisle. “Can I pick the flavor?” he wants to know. Blaine gives a shrug in response, glancing over cans of soup. “Can I get chocolate?” Kale follows up.
“You can get whatever flavor you like,” Blaine answers.
“Even pi-snatch-o?”
Blaine glances down at his son a moment, confused before giving a short chuckle. “Pistachio, bud. And you don’t like pistachios.”
“Those are the green ones, right?” At Blaine’s nod, Kale pulls a disgusted face and shakes his head vehemently. “I don’t . But you said I could get any flavor. I wanted to see if you were lying.”
Blaine just studies Kale a moment before laughing openly. Ruffling the boy’s mass of curls, he comments, “You have to be getting this from your Daddy, you know. That is the only explanation I have.” Grinning down at Kale, he takes his hand again and moves along. “Why don’t we get something we all like instead of testing the bounds of my patience, sanity and tolerance?”
“Mmkay, then I want Mint Chocolate Chip ‘cause that’s the good kind of green ice cream,” Kale answers, easily aborting all thoughts of testing his papa’s word.
“I down with that,” Blaine says, swinging their joined hands in a wide arc. “C’mon, cereal time,” he says, leading Kale off with him to the next aisle.
“Can I pick out a cereal too?” Kale asks, rubber soles of his sneakers tapping against the scuffed linoleum.
“Sure, what kind do you want?” Blaine asks as they stand before the line of brightly colored boxes.
Kale sends a cheeky grin up to his papa, tugging on his hand a little, and announces, “Pistachio.”
Blaine blinks down at his son a moment before smirking and reaching down to tweak his nose. “You're pushing your luck, bud.”