A/N: Inspired by the Kurtoberfest prompt 'nightmare' (in spirit), and gives homage to KurtbastianAlways's fic 'No Tears in Paradise', by borrowing the texted pictures of Blaine. Future Fic AU that assumes Kurt and Blaine didn't meet Sebastian at Dalton.Not Klaine or Blaine friendly.
One night.
It was supposed to be one night.
No commitments. No regrets.
One night of slightly anonymous sex to get the angst out of his system. So many things lately have been piling on his shoulder – competing over an upcoming promotion, his stepbrother's plans to join the military, his father's health…his ex-fiancé.
Well, recently sort-of-ex fiancé.
They weren't broken up, per se. They were supposedly taking a break.
Blaine had been so upbeat when he broke the news to Kurt. Apparently, he'd been thinking it over for a while, but Kurt – he'd been blindsided.
Kurt had invested a good portion of his adult life in this relationship, worked as hard on it as he had just about anything. Now, he was in stasis, everyday fielding questions from well-meaning friends at work, who were also in stasis, since they'd all already been invited to the wedding, and were probably wondering if they should return the gifts they'd bought.
It was a fucking nightmare.
Kurt and Blaine had been high school sweethearts. They were one another's first kiss, first love, first time. Kurt still loved him, and Blaine assured Kurt on the day he moved out that he loved Kurt to the moon and back. (It had sounded sweet the first few times Blaine had said it, but to be honest, it had started getting on Kurt's nerves.) But the man that Kurt thought he would happily spend the rest of his life with said he needed a little more time to be sure.
Sure they weren't being too rash was how he explained it.
Sure he wasn't missing out on something better was what Kurt heard.
As it turned out, Kurt might have been partially right, if the photos of Blaine being blown by some male stripper covered in glitter that accidentally got texted to his phone a few nights ago were any indication.
Kurt didn't want to mope anymore. He didn't want to sit home on Friday nights crying while Blaine was out partying and having fun. And besides, turnabout was fair play. Kurt trolled the bars, knocking back a shot at each one, and eventually found a worthy participant for a one-night sexcapade of his own.
The handcuffs weren't Kurt's idea. The man he picked up – Stephen? Seymour? Sheldon (God, he hopes it's not Sheldon)? – claimed he couldn't cum unless he was cuffed, a kink he had developed in his college days that ruined him for future vanilla sex. Kurt had never met a man with a kink like that. It was exciting. Blaine expected every between the sheets encounter to be making love – the slow, passionate, candlelit, massage oil infused, Barry White playing in the background variety. It was romantic, which Kurt loved, but it was also exhausting. There was a lot of expectation rolled up in making every round of sex a black tie event.
To be honest, Kurt was getting tired of that, too. So many times he had wanted to see Blaine cut loose, ditch the hair gel, tear off the cardigan, leave his bowtie at home, and just go crazy.
Apparently, he had it in him, but he didn't want to share it with Kurt,
Just with strippers…covered in glitter.
Kurt was all for the handcuffs at the time. Locked to his headboard, arms over his head, this man, with the most exquisitely sculpted six-pack Kurt had ever seen outside of a magazine, looked hotter than mere words could handle.
But now, the morning after, with both of them suffering from massive bed-head and severe stale-alcohol morning breath, Kurt thinks it was immature and stupid.
Especially since he has no way of opening the damned things.
Yeah, cuffing the guy Kurt was supposed to have no strings attached sex with to his bed kind of defeated the purpose.
It's almost Freudian in its slippage.
They had left the key to the cuffs on Kurt's nightstand. Kurt was sure they would be safe there. How could they not be? That's where he left his condoms, his Ambien, and his titanium-and-diamond cufflinks, and he's never misplaced any of those.
But this handcuff key – this smaller-than-small and far-too-necessary piece of metal – somehow managed to go astray.
At least Kurt knows where it ended up.
Kurt woke before his overnight guest and saw it happen. In the haze of a too late night, too early morning, coupled with too much alcohol and an overall malaise brought on by heartbreak and depression, he was too slow to stop his tortoiseshell tabby when she found the silver key. She sniffed it. She batted it with her paws. She licked it.
Then, she swallowed it.
He'd already called the emergency hotline of the vet hospital in hysterics, and when hysterical, Kurt tends to say more than he should. The overnight vet tech giggled throughout the entire ten minute phone call, but she assured him that the key should pass normally in the next ten to twenty-four hours. If not, give them a call back.
She also recommended calling a locksmith. She even gave him a number.
Kurt knew he'd never be able to go to that vet hospital again. God save poor Elphie if she swallows something more lethal than a handcuff key. They'll be driving all the way to Queens.
Kurt called the number she gave him, and luckily the locksmith, Greg, said he had a slow morning. He'd be there within the next forty-five minutes. So Kurt is stuck with Stalin (?) cuffed to his headboard for the next three-quarters of an hour.
But none of that is the big ticket issue at the moment.
None of that is the reason why he's sitting stunned on his side of the bed, his arm wrapped around himself, staring at the phone he just got off of.
The issue, at present, is the text message he saw, lingering in the background for the duration of the call. He opened it the second he saw it.
But he didn't see it soon enough.
To: Kurt
From: Dad
Surprise! We just got in town. We're twenty minutes away, and guess who we brought with us? I'll give you a hint – a certain soon-to-be son-in-law. See you in a few, kiddo.
The time stamp on the message – fifteen minutes ago.
Why? Why him? Why, on his one night of fun in months – and he had to admit, fooling around with a handsome stranger had been a blast – did this have to happen to him?
His dad doesn't do surprise visits. He's very much like Kurt, needing to plan everything down to the letter, making sure everything is in place, that he wouldn't be putting anyone out by stopping by unannounced.
Kurt can only remember one other time his father has done this, but otherwise, no. Never.
"Uh…hello?" Kurt hears a rattle, like the radiator on the other end of his apartment trying to start up after a cold night. "Hello? Can you hear me there, Major Tom?"
Kurt would have turned toward the groggy voice trying to get his attention, but he had gone catatonic.
He thought he might have blacked out for a few seconds.
"Hey, princess?" The clanging of metal against metal narrowly gets Kurt's notice, but he can't seem to move. "This has been fun and all, but I don't really do morning afters. You want to help me get these off?"
Kurt stands up, needing to get away from him, but he doesn't acknowledge him. Maybe if he doesn't look at the man (Scott?) he'll somehow disappear, poof! into thin air, and no one will be any the wiser. Kurt paces the room with his cell phone in his hands, trying to picture a future that doesn't have his dad, his stepmom, his stepbrother, and from the looks of it, his ex-fiancé, barging into his apartment and finding that he spent last night with a man handcuffed to his bed. But Kurt can't visualize that future, because that future doesn't exist. Not now, not ever. His life is over. He knows his life is over. In (he checks the time on his phone and whimpers at how much has gone by) three and a half minutes, his life will definitely be over.
Maybe they don't even have to come in to the apartment? he thinks, stopping his steps. Yeah, that's it. He'll get dressed, answer the door on the first ring, and usher everyone out for an early morning breakfast, his treat. He can leave his spare key with his neighbor, Sam (Ooo! Maybe his name's Sam! No, that's not it…), and have him let the locksmith in when he arrives. Then Steven (?) will be gone, out of his life, and Kurt will never have to see him again.
And therein lies another problem.
This man wasn't just a great fuck. Hanging out with him was fun – no stress, no mess, no weird hang-ups, no history.
Maybe there is something to what Blaine said after all. Maybe Kurt owes it to himself to do a little exploring, too.
Maybe there is something bigger and better out there on the horizon for Kurt Hummel than Blaine Anderson.
But he isn't getting the chance to consider it. Not this morning, not when he needs to sit in a dark corner, with a gallon bottle of water and a jar of aspirin. Then he can think it over properly.
"Maybe we got off to a bad start," the man says, straining against the cuff on his wrist to try and hold out his hand for Kurt to shake. "My name's Sebastian. Sebastian Smythe. I don't quite remember your name. You are?"
Kurt hears a knock at the front door and groans. Jesus Christ! Was his dad speeding? Well, so much for opening the door on the first ring…uh, knock. But that's fine. It's still all fine. He'll throw on his jeans and a shirt, and get them the hell out of…
He hears some fumbling, a key in the lock turning and opening. A chorus of four chipper voices sings through the open door consecutively, like a barbershop quartet, "Hello…hello…hello…hello!"
Oh right. Blaine didn't leave his copy of the key when he left. Kurt had forgotten.
Another fucking key screwing him over.
Kurt looks at Sebastian's torqued hand, extended awkwardly in greeting, his wrist shackled to the headboard, his body naked beneath a thin white sheet, and shakes his head.
"I'm totally fucked."