A/N: Based on this prompt by reliquiaen - AU where people age until they reach 18 and then stop aging until they meet their soul mate so they can grow old together. There's already been a few lovey-dovey ones written, but I like the idea that other people may not be as thrilled with the concept of soul mates. Warning for angst.
Sebastian walks into the bar, makes his way as far to the back as possible, finds a table, and sits down. He chooses a seat facing the door – a seat where he can see everyone coming and going. A seat where he can see anyone who might be looking for him.
Constant vigilance - that's how he's made it this far.
He looks up at the clock on the wall – one of those tacky, plasticky deals with billiard balls for numbers. It's 8:15. Same time he came in here last night. Same time he came in here the night before. Sebastian shakes his head, disappointed at himself. He's not normally a creature of habit, doesn't adhere to set schedules. A man on the run can't afford to be predictable, but lately he's been a little more lax than usual with his routine. He's either gotten cocky in his old age, or stupid. Or just plain tired. Tired of running from the demon at his heels. He's actually sort of settled down and made shallow roots. This town – a rundown plot of nowhere off Interstate 86 - is the closest thing to home that he's had in a while. And this bar, he's come here enough times that the owner knows his name and the waitress knows the bullet points of his story - probably a big clue that he should get to stepping.
Shelby, the waitress, comes up to his table and sets a square paper napkin down.
"Will you be drinking your dinner tonight?" she asks as a greeting.
"The usual," Sebastian says, even though he can see it sitting on her tray – an amber bottle of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale.
"I.D." Shelby gives Sebastian a wry smile and holds out her hand. Sebastian rolls his eyes, but he pulls out his wallet.
"Are you seriously going to do this every time I come in?" he asks, handing over his driver's license.
"Yup," she says, taking it from him. Barely glancing at it, she hands it back.
"I've been coming here for weeks," Sebastian comments, sticking the license back into his wallet.
"And I've told you before. State rules. I can't be too careful with you fucking bachelors hanging around. You never know when someone from the licensing board might come in."
Sebastian smirks at the word 'bachelor', at the way Shelby says it, as if being unattached was a crime. Too many people in the world wrapped up in the idea of soul mates in Sebastian's opinion. Like finding your significant other was such a prize, such a gift.
In Sebastian's eyes, it's a death sentence.
"You know, I've never seen someone so darn eager to avoid the inevitable," Shelby says, putting the bottle of pale ale in front of him.
"Well," Sebastian says, grabbing the bottle and taking a quick sip, "take a good long look."
Shelby chuckles. "I have…" She looks Sebastian over with appreciative eyes. She might have already found her soul mate, but that doesn't mean she can't look. "And I can see the appeal. I don't know how long you've been at this, honey, but you at eighteen…well, it's definitely something." Shelby whistles low when PG-rated words fail. "But you can't run forever."
"I have so far," Sebastian says. For the last hundred and fifty-seven years.
"You're going to have to face the music eventually."
"You know," Sebastian says with outright annoyance, "this whole soul mate thing, it's fucked up. You stop aging when you reach eighteen and then go on forever like this until you find your so-called soul mate, giving up eternal life, eternal youth, for someone else. How are you okay with having that forced on you?"
"It's biology," Shelby says with a one-shoulder shrug, unaffected by Sebastian's anger. "You can't escape biology."
"It's shit is what it is." Sebastian takes another sip – a longer one, hoping for that buzz in his brain that will take him away from his frustration for a while. "Maybe you've drunk the Kool-Aid, but I haven't."
Shelby turns her head for a second to peek at the man wiping down the bar. The bartender catches her eye and smiles. Shelby smiles back.
"It's not so bad," she says fondly, turning back to address Sebastian. "Besides, even if you don't want it, it's going to catch up with you one day."
Sebastian sneers. "Yeah, well that day isn't today."
Shelby chuckles again. "You never know," she sings, turning on her heel and walking away with her tray, throwing him a wink over her shoulder.
"You never know," Sebastian mocks under his breath, downing the rest of his beer. He sits back in his chair, slouching with his legs spread open in an appalling display, but he doesn't care. He's not trying to impress anyone. In fact, the more people who get repelled by his lack of couth, the better. He glances over at the bar and sees the bartender, Ryan – Shelby's soul mate – nod questioningly in his direction. Sebastian nods back. Ryan raises a hand in understanding and goes back to the kitchen to make Sebastian his dinner, also a usual – Salisbury steak, mashed potatoes, and broccoli. They whip it up special for him here.
Sebastian sighs deeply and closes his eyes.
These people know him. He has to get out of here.
Sebastian's body grows heavy and his mind starts to drift. He's no lightweight. One beer wouldn't put him under, so it has to be exhaustion. He's been running too long, and Shelby's right. It will catch up to him one day. But he's not ready. He's never been ready, and he doesn't see himself ever being ready. He's seen many of his friends from school find their soul mates – some right after graduation, some a few years later. One boy that Sebastian had crushed on hard was apparently attending school his entire life with his soul mate – from kindergarten through high school - and neither of them knew until their eighteenth birthdays.
They were so happy when it happened. So fucking elated.
They're both gone now.
In fact, of all his high school and college friends, only he and one other guy have been left out of this fucking insane loop.
Sebastian's thoughts stop short.
Correction. His friend Jeff found his soul mate Nick a few days ago. Sebastian got the email yesterday morning. They found each other, out of the blue, in aisle four of a Stater Bros. grocery store, both reaching for the same jar of salad olives.
They bumped elbows, and they knew.
Which is why, with a wave of his hand, Sebastian orders another beer, and he's going to keep them coming until he can't walk straight.
When he wakes up tomorrow, he'll leave.
"Excuse me, can I use your phone…"
"Yeah, yeah, I see you, Sebastian," Shelby calls out.
"…my car broke down out front, and I can't seem to get a cell phone signal out here…"
"You can put your hand down now, Sebastian," Shelby scolds with a laugh. "I'll get you your goddamned beer!"
But Sebastian can't put his hand down. It's gone numb. It doesn't even feel like part of him anymore. That heaviness weighing down on him, the one that keeps him trapped in his chair, beckoning him with sleep, has taken over his entire body. In other locations on his body, an odd, sharp tingle creeps into his skin. It starts in the soles of his feet and rises through his limbs, clawing up his muscles, in his veins, on its way to his head.
Sebastian's not sure exactly what it is, but he knows it started the moment he heard that far away voice ask for a phone.
Sebastian remembers something about this, something he read or heard ages ago. He probably learned it in health class, where people usually learned the specifics about this soul mate bullshit, though Sebastian's information is most likely dated. Soul mates, bonded or unbonded, can feel when they're in the vicinity of one another. There are dozens of ways. A sneeze, a breath, locking a gaze, the sound of a voice…
Sebastian panics.
Fuck! No no no no no! It can't be! Fuck fuck fuck!
He has to get out. He wants to run but he can't risk it.
Don't make a scene. Don't attract attention.
All he has to do is leave – calmly get up and walk out. He'll take the back door, past the bathrooms.
"Sure," Ryan says to the man at the bar. "We have a payphone in the back but it doesn't need any quarters or nothing. Just pick up the receiver and dial."
"Great!" the man says, sounding relieved, his sigh washing through Sebastian's body like a summer breeze. "So, it's in the back?"
"Right-o," Ryan says. "Next to the bathrooms."
Shit!
Sebastian's eyes snap open. His body still feels heavy, his head swimming, but he finds the strength to stand. The bar is full of people, way more than when Sebastian got here, but for the moment, Sebastian sees only one other person – a man, tall and lean, dressed completely out of place for this tiny roadside hamlet. Even Sebastian, who favors Brooks Brothers and Burberry, finds himself stunned by this man's impressive style sense, maybe more specifically at how his McQueen slacks mold themselves to his legs, or how expertly tailored his shirt looks, the fabric of each article conforming perfectly to suit him. The man walks in Sebastian's direction, gazing down at his hand, which he's shaking, opening and closing his fist as if the hand might be asleep. The man starts rubbing his arm, rolling it at the shoulder. He looks up suddenly, the smile fading from his face at the sight of Sebastian, crowding against the table in a vain effort to get away.
Sebastian puts up both hands, warning the man without words to keep his distance, afraid to speak and have this man affected the same way he was. But the man just stands and stares, wide eyed, as if he sees a train coming his way. Sebastian realizes that this man might have also come to the 'soul mate' conclusion, and that they might both have the same thoughts on the subject. The man takes a step back, looking like he's about to bolt himself.
Is this enough? Sebastian wonders. Is finding each other like this enough to form a bond? Sebastian doesn't think so. From what he's heard, they would physically need to touch in order to become joined. There's apparently a tragic story about a couple who found out they were soul mates while they were held in the same prison. The man was in a detention level above the woman, and even though they could feel that they were close, they didn't meet and touch for decades.
Sucked for them, but that might mean Sebastian has a chance.
"Oh my God!" a voice booms from across the room. "Are you Kurt Hummel?"
The man, paralyzed where he stands with fear in his eyes, adverts his gaze toward a drunk woman lumbering over – chubby red cheeks bunched up beneath her eyes in a radiant smile as she stumbles over.
"You are Kurt Hummel! I thought (hic)…I thought I recognized you!"
"Oh," the man – Kurt - squeaks, looking from the woman picking her way clumsily through the tables, to Sebastian, inching back, pushing the table with him.
"It is! And on my birthday, too!" she cheers, reaching him and clapping him hard on the back. "I saw you play Mo in that alt version of Rent on Broadway a few years back. I think (hic) that you're (hic-hic) inter-…inte-…interpretation of Maureen was the best ever!" She clears her throat and stands up straighter. "There will always be people in rubber flirting with me," she recites, trying her hand at an impression (a lousy one, Kurt thinks), and then doubles over laughing. "Classic!" she chortles. Kurt laughs uncomfortably with her, humoring her while subtly trying to pull himself away.
"Th-thank you," he says, his voice making the tingle in Sebastian's arm stronger. The tingling pulls at him the more Kurt speaks, as if trying to convince him on a level wound into his DNA to reach out and touch Kurt. "It's always nice to be recognized." Kurt's eyes immediately dart to Sebastian.
"Com'on over," the woman slurs, grabbing Kurt's arm and tugging, "there're some people at my table who would loooove to meet you!"
Kurt follows, both frustrated and relieved by this drunken intervention. He takes a last look at the man rounding the table, heading for the back door, then trails behind the persistent woman who has taken possession of his arm. He's not thrilled at being fawned over by sozzled fans. He's eager to get in his car and out of this place, a place he couldn't even find on his GPS - that is, before the thing's battery died and it blinked off. But without the deceptively strong hand locked around his wrist, he might not have left this run-in with his possible soul mate unscathed. At least Kurt has an idea of what the man looks like for later reference, and Kurt is not disappointed. But he has worked too hard and too long at his Broadway career to have it end in the butt-fuck middle of nowhere. Why his BMW decided to crap out here, Kurt will never know, but the second he passed by this place, his gauges went wacky and his engine made an alarming sound. Then the whole thing seized and went dead. Kurt took a look under the hood, but even with years of working in his father's auto shop behind him, he couldn't see a single thing wrong.
Kurt's best friend, Mercedes, would call this fate. Kurt chalks it up to his run-of-the-mill fickle sense of luck, the same luck that caused him to lose his wallet and access to all his money his first night in New York, but had him bunking in a youth hostel with a distant grandson of Andrew Lloyd Weber whom he shared his turkey on rye with, thus landing him his first role in a Broadway musical.
Whatever it is – fate or fickle luck - it doesn't seem to be done with him yet.
What happens next unfurls like a scene from a Laurel and Hardy movie that only made it as far as the cutting room floor.
A shirtless man carrying an enormous birthday cake on a tray, a fire hazard of candles sticking out and lit, storms through the front door. A stripper, Kurt realizes, when he gets a better look.
"Is there a Carole Carman here?" the man announces cheerfully to the bar, blowing into a paper party horn. "I heard there's a special birthday girl somewhere waiting for some…cake!"
The drunk fan drops Kurt's wrist.
"I'm Carole! I'm Carole!" she crows, bouncing up and down with an arm waving in the air, sweeping dangerously close to Kurt's head. The women at the table where Kurt was being dragged hoot and whistle as they leave their chairs behind, and Kurt sees an opportunity to get away.
More screaming starts when another five shirtless men come racing in through the bar's back door, stopping Sebastian from making his hasty retreat. From behind the bar, a fleet of waitresses emerge carrying plates and cups. Another goes around the crowd changing fives and tens into singles.
Sebastian dodges waitresses and strippers left and right. Kurt, avoiding the women barreling at him to join their friend, skids over the top of a table to keep from getting trampled. When Kurt lands, he catches his foot on the leg of a chair and trips forward. The chair slides away from him, slamming into Sebastian as he stumbles backward to avoid a collision with Shelby and her tray of tequila shots. The chair somehow rights itself without falling over and Sebastian falls into the seat.
That's when Kurt follows, dropping right into his lap.
They might have still escaped, might have still made it, if Kurt didn't raise his hands on instinct.
He accidentally brushes Sebastian's cheek, and the whole of time stops.
The cheering of the patrons gathered around the strippers, cutting cake, and singing off-key 'Happy Birthdays' dim. The only two people in existence for the next eight-point-three seconds are Kurt and Sebastian – now and forever KurtandSebastian.
Sebastian has holes in his life, but he's used to those spaces being empty. He's learned to cope without the connections that everyone else craves. But with Kurt's touch seeping into his skin, those holes are being filled, painfully so, and Sebastian doesn't like it.
Well, he doesn't want to like it. He can't deny the heat that comes with it, the calming sense of completion, the damned, indefinable rightness of it.
Kurt swallows hard. He doesn't want to like it, either. He doesn't want the way his hand on this man's cheek makes him feel that – after years of living out of a suitcase – he's finally found his way home.
When the shock of it starts to fade, Kurt exhales, the silence replaced with the sounds of life again – life anew. "Well," he says, taking a breath, "fuck."
Sebastian raises his eyes to look into Kurt's face, but he ends up looking past him. He catches Shelby and Ryan watching them from behind the bar, wearing content smiles the way pleased people do when they think they've seen something beautiful and serendipitous.
If Sebastian had only left this morning, he would have missed Kurt by one day. One fucking day.
He feels sick.
His soul mate - the man sitting in his lap, back rigid, knees pressed together tight to keep them from shaking - looks pretty green himself.
"So, I guess I'm your soul mate," Kurt says, looking down at his balled fists resting on his knees.
"Yeah," Sebastian agrees, hit full-on with a resounding sense of dread. "I guess you are." He runs a hand through his own hair, yanking in frustration. "Fuck!"