disclaimer: without prejudice. the names of all characters contained here-in are the property of FOX and Ryan Murphy. no infringments of these copyrights are intended, and are used here without permission.
author's notes: written for Seblaine Sunday, prompt: nerd.
Human Cyborg Relations;;
He's surprised the first thing he hears when entering the apartment is his own voice coming from the living room. It's definitely his, there's no doubt about it, though he sounds younger.
"Sebastian?" he calls, but gets no response, and until walking into the living room he's convinced Sebastian's going through his audition tapes or his Vines rather than unpack like he promised he would.
It takes him exactly 3.2 seconds to realize Sebastian's watching an entirely different tape, one he barely remembers recording, but it resonates somewhere in the recesses of his teenhood memories.
His time capsule.
"Where did you find that?" he asks, and Sebastian pauses the video.
He looks at his eighteen-year-old reflection on the flatscreen, staring back at him bright-eyed and confident as unease settles deep into his pores. How far had Sebastian gotten? He can't remember much of what's in the video, he recorded it eight years ago, but there's mention of Kurt and their break-up.
Would that be enough to upset Sebastian?
"It was in one of the boxes you told me to unpack," Sebastian answers and gets up from the couch. "It wasn't labelled." He grins. "Once I got to the stem cells bit I couldn't stop."
His eyes go wide while his heartbeat skyrockets. "You watched the whole thing?"
"About three times now." Sebastian pulls him closer and wires his fingers through his curls. "I'm so glad I talked you out of the hair gel."
"Hmm," he hums, getting lost in the back and forth of Sebastian's fingers tugging at his hair, before their lips meet. His hands clutch at Sebastian's waist and he rises on his toes, the need to reach more of Sebastian overwhelming his worries.
He supposes this is his own fault, his nostalgia would probably result in more remnants of his teenage years popping up. He'd never realized how much stuff he owned before having to pack it all up into boxes. He'd thrown out so many things, clothes that no longer fit, documents he didn't need anymore, receipts and Christmas cards–it wasn't easy parting with it all, but he had a whole new collection of clutter to start now that he was moving in with his boyfriend.
But he'd assumed the unlabelled DVD was an old audition tape he'd kept so he could get nostalgic when he wanted to. This wasn't exactly what he was planning.
Sebastian releases his lips. "How'd your callback go?"
He blinks. He'd almost forgotten all about his good news. "I got the part."
Sebastian smiles wide. "I told you." He pulls back and makes his way into the kitchen. "We're gonna celebrate," Sebastian calls. "We're going to order in from that fancy place you like and crank open a bottle of wine."
He slowly walks over to the kitchen island, dragging his feet, his unease returning. "It's not a big deal."
"Not a big deal?" Sebastian turns around, one of their take-out menus in hand. "It's all you've been talking about for the past three weeks."
And Sebastian's right, he'd focused on this audition so hard that after three weeks they were still living out of the carton boxes littered all over the apartment, and they'd gotten frustrated about not finding specific items more than once. For the most part, Sebastian hadn't complained, he'd been supportive and understanding throughout–it was only a small part in an off-Broadway show, but he was fully prepared to be a struggling artist for a while.
Up until a few minutes ago he'd been ecstatic, and the idea of celebrating had sounded enticing especially if it involved them getting naked with cuddles afterwards, but now he's worried. He's worried that Sebastian will use this tape as fuel the next time they fight, that Kurt will always come up between them. He loves Sebastian more than anything, but he knows his boyfriend as well as Sebastian knows him.
He draws aimless circles over the marble of the counter. "Do we need to talk about–the tape?" he asks, and carefully looks up at Sebastian.
Sebastian inhales deeply. "You're right," he says, "Sit down."
He panics right there and then, Sebastian's tone fails to betray the course this conversation will take, but he fears they'll tumble into another fight where Sebastian plays the Kurt-card time and again–it breaks his heart, to think that of all his flaws his much too forgiving nature is Sebastian's biggest insecurity, and it's always brought back to a relationship he had with a boy Sebastian happens to know. Sebastian's never insecure about the two that came in between.
He sits down on a stool and waits for Sebastian to come to him, his heart racing.
Sebastian closes the distance between them and takes hold of his hands. "I'm not sure how to say this–"
He swallows hard, preparing for impact.
Sebastian looks him in the eye. "Cyborgs, honey?" he asks. "Really?"
His fear turns into indignation in an instant. He glowers. "I deeply dislike you."
Sebastian presses a kiss to his lips before he can move out of reach. "I know for a fact that's not true," he smiles, and skips back to their newly bought bookcase, where he'd been trying to alphabetize all their books, DVDs and CDs.
"Bas, I'm serious." He sighs, and walks over. "Do we need to talk about this?"
"No, we don't." Sebastian turns around. "We spent enough time talking about Kurt when we started dating and I bring up his name enough when we're fighting. It's in the past. I'm cool."
"Cool?"
"All I saw in that video was my nerdy boyfriend the way I remember seeing him the first time we met. Hair gel, cardigan," –Sebastian thumbs at his cheek– "incredibly gorgeous eyes."
He closes his eyes to Sebastian's touch, reassured that for the time being this won't be an issue until Sebastian decides to make it one–then again, the video's merely a snapshot of things Sebastian already knew, and like he said, a snapshot of him when he was eighteen years old.
"And confessing a latent homoerotic kink for seriously decked out men," Sebastian adds.
His eyes shoot open. "What?"
Sebastian laughs. "Apparently your eighteen-year-old self was in denial about who his second husband could really be."
He beams, though his cheeks flush red. "No, he'd still be my second husband."
Sebastian's eyes narrow on his face, but a smile slides to a corner of his mouth. "You're such a nerd," he says, cupping his face with his hands, their lips and tongues meeting in a deep kiss before Sebastian sends them tumbling backwards onto the couch.
They spend the rest of the night getting naked, cuddling, and watching the video over and over again until their jaws hurt from laughing.
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