A/N: Okay, this is a Zombie!Sebastian AU from a prompt I apparently gave to myself. If you are a loyal follower of my blog, you might have read where I write in my sleep, and ended up giving myself a zombie prompt. Many of my readers said it sounded like an 'In The Flesh' AU, but as I don't watch that show, any similarities are awesome, but entirely unintended. This story is written in two styles. The first half is a normal narrative. The second half is written from Kurt's perspective, via journal entries. This is meant to be romantic and angsty more than gory, so even though there are some zombie elements, it's not extreme. But tread with caution. I was approached by many people to expand this storyline and I finally have :) Futurefic, angst, romance, major character death, minor blood and gore.

"Please, sir," the ancient, decrepit woman hissed, but not unkindly. It was simply a symptom of her thick accent coupled with her indeterminable old age that caused her to talk that way. "Please, reconsider this decision."

Kurt looked at the woman, his eyes bloodshot, his hair a mass of tangled, wayward strands, his lips quivering from constant, unrelenting crying.

"You said you had it!" Kurt whined, bypassing her arguments. "You said you would sell it to me! Why else would I come here?"

"You need to understand," the woman implored, opening her hands in a pleading gesture, fixing Kurt with one clear blue eye (the other clouded – a useless, milky white lump of tissue almost hanging from its socket), "what you ask for, it's…unnatural."

"But, your granddaughter said you had it!" Kurt persisted. He shot a steely glare at the simpering young woman, who ducked behind her grandmother and hid from his volatile sight.

"My granddaughter is a foolish girl," the woman said, directing the comment over her shoulder to the girl cowering there, "but she means well. We need the money. She was thinking with her head and not her heart."

"I can pay you twice what you're asking for!" Kurt pleaded, reaching into his back pocket for his wallet. "Three times! I'll give you whatever you want! I came here in a Mercedes. I'll give that to you!"

The trembling girl peeked out from over her grandmother's shoulder, but the woman turned and barked sharply at her in a language Kurt could not begin to understand.

"Mr. Hummel…" the old woman reached out to comfort Kurt, taking his shaking hand in hers, "your husband is dead, and I am more sorry than I can ever express at your loss. You carry your love for him like a beacon…"

Kurt's face crumbled at her words – hot tears falling anew down his ruddy cheeks.

"It shines from every part of you, but it is up to you to carry it now. It will never fade, as long as you remember him."

"I don't want to remember him," Kurt whimpered, his voice cracking. "I want him here with me. I want you to help me bring him back."

The woman shook of her head.

"The effects of life are varied, Mr. Hummel. The effects of death should remain permanent."

Kurt flinched.

Permanent.

Sebastian dead…his husband gone…and nothing for Kurt to look forward to in life but emptiness. Every moment of their life they had planned together. One asshole drunk driver later and Kurt was alone.

Just like when he was younger.

Just like when he lost his mom.

Kurt let the sorrow within him curdle, souring to anger.

He yanked his hand out of the old woman's grasp.

"Your granddaughter said there were other methods of getting what I wanted," Kurt snarled. "More dangerous methods. Methods that might require payment in sacrifice…even blood."

The old woman snapped her head back over her shoulder, scolding her granddaughter in a harsh, guttural voice, and the girl who had started to brave coming out of hiding shrank down once again.

"Alright, Mr. Hummel," the woman sighed. "I will sell the potion to you at the promised price."

Kurt stared for a moment in relief and shock, opening up his wallet with the onset of happier tears and thumbing through the bills, pulling out a little extra out of joy for getting what he wanted. He passed the money over, but the woman didn't want to touch it. The granddaughter popped out long enough to grab the money and then scurried away again. The woman reached into the folds of her skirts, to a leather pouch that Kurt could see hanging from a thin belt around her waist. She reached a hand in and slowly fished out a tiny bottle of blue glass with a cork stopper sealing the mouth. She extended her arm to hand Kurt the bottle, and for the first time her hand shook.

"Pour the contents of this bottle into your husband's mouth, Mr. Hummel," the woman instructed, "and your husband will return."

Kurt held the bottle up to the dim candlelight of the musty, cluttered SoHo shop. The blue glass glimmered, and a thick liquid inside swayed back and forth, shimmering slightly as it moved.

"There are some rules that go along with that potion," the woman said, her voice weeding into Kurt's head, summoning him back from his momentary trance, "and a few warnings you must heed as well."

Kurt had hoped it would be a simple matter of giving his husband the liquid and living happily ever after, but Kurt knew realistically that nothing was that simple.

"Okay," he said, slipping the bottle carefully into his pocket and patting over it twice to insure it was safe.

"First of all, you will give that to your husband, but what will come back…" she paused and swallowed hard, "will not entirely be your husband."

Kurt nodded. He had expected her to say something along those lines. It was like a scene straight from Practical Magic (with him being Sandra Bullock, of course).

The woman fixed both eyes, clear and clouded, on Kurt's face as he stared back at her expectantly, waiting for her to finish her speech so he could go back to his home and get on with his life.

She realized with deep regret that he had every intention of going through with this, and sighed, taking on a heavy burden in allowing this to continue.

"Be there to look into his eyes when he awakes," she said.

Kurt hadn't dreamed of leaving his side, but since the woman made such a point of it, he became intrigued.

"Why?"

"He is being reborn, in a sense," she said. "And like other simple-minded creatures he will imprint on the first person he sees." She took his hands and squeezed them. "That person needs to be you."

Kurt's gulp was audible, the weight of her words and of his plan suddenly settling on him. He felt it all pressing in him, like that moment when the police came to his door. It turned him inside out, left his heart out in the cold.

He felt that cold now.

"Once the potion absorbs into his tissues, it will restart his heart," she continued. "Then the potion will replicate. It will begin to take the place of his blood. It will make him calm, easier for you to control."

Kurt nodded again. He wanted to say something, to assure the woman that he understood, but she didn't pause long enough for him to speak.

It didn't matter. He could see the trepidation in her one, clear eye. He wasn't sure exactly what to say to make this better.

"It will be a slow process, and you must learn to be a patient man!" She raised her voice, scolding him, letting go of one hand to waggle an emphatic finger in front of his face. "You will be teaching him, raising him as you would a child. Remember that even if only a small portion of his soul returns, that soul belongs to your husband, and you must love him or this will not work."

The woman stepped back, out of breath from her outburst, and the granddaughter (whom Kurt had forgotten about) returned, pushing up an ornate but dusty antique chair. Kurt held the woman's arms gently and helped her down into it. The woman sat and waved both of them off, not wanting them to make a fuss when she still had more to say.

"But most importantly," the woman labored on, barely missing a beat in her speech, "do not let him taste live blood in any form." Kurt knelt down closer so that the woman didn't feel the need to yell for her words to reach him. "Don't let him bite you or lick your wounds. Or anyone else's – human or animal."

Kurt gasped, remembering the last Walking Dead marathon he and Sebastian had watched. Sebastian thought the show was hilarious, but Kurt could barely make it to the middle of the first season. He had started with his hands over his eyes, then with his arm locked around Sebastian's, anxiously smacking his shoulder, and finally with most of his body lying over his husband's lap and his face buried in his shirt.

"Would it make you feel better if we turned off the show and fucked?" Sebastian had asked, and Kurt had happily acquiesced, straddling his husband's hips and riding him into the leather upholstery.

"Will I turn into a zombie, too?" Kurt asked, returning quickly, but with obvious reluctance, from his daydream. "If he does bite me?"

"No," the woman said with an actual chuckle. "Not in this case. That's not the nature of this spell. No. Live blood will give him back his memories."

Kurt looked at the woman and shook his head in confusion.

"It will ignite his brain," she continued. "He will begin to feel. In many ways, he will become more the man you married than in any other way."

"Wh—" Kurt stuttered, baffled as to how that could be a bad thing. If drinking his blood could make him more Sebastian, Kurt would set up an IV drip the minute he got home. He would serve him cups of his blood with every meal. "Why wouldn't I want that again?" Kurt asked, dry and plain, trying not to sound like turning his revived husband into a blood-sipping fiend wasn't the greatest idea in known history.

The old woman smiled, but it wasn't a fond smile. It was shrewd, as if she could read every one of his thoughts, and she didn't approve.

"Once he has his memories back, he will start to crave it. Soon, drinking blood won't be enough for him. It won't work as well. It won't keep the memories as fresh. He will have to go further, do more. He will become a killer."

Kurt's face blanched and the woman laughed again, this time with a touch of wicked humor.

"You are playing with the laws of nature, Mr. Hummel," she said, shaking her head and patting him on the cheek. "You are responsible, now, not only for your own life, but for the life of those around you."

The woman leaned in close, those eyes – one alive, one dead - more menacing now than when he had walked into the shop, her face no longer that of a frail old woman but of a maniacally powerful witch.

"So, don't fuck it up."

Kurt drove from the city back to the Hamptons completely on autopilot. He kept the windows down and breathed in deep the cold, coastal air, trying not to think too hard about what he was about to do. He put on his iPod and cranked up the volume, listening to Showtunes and singing along emphatically, his voice splintering on notes that were usual no problem for him to hit. He tried to focus on everything and anything beside his dead husband waiting for him, lying out on their bed, naked, his body packed in ice, air conditioner blasting on high to keep decomposition at bay.

Kurt was a massive heady ball of contradictions, flying down the highway at felony speeds, both exhilarated and terrified at the venture he was about to embark on. The old woman wasn't wrong – Kurt was tampering with the laws on nature. He loved Sebastian - more than anything, more than maybe even his own life - but Sebastian was dead, and in the eyes of the universe there should be nothing Kurt could do to change that.

But there was.

He found it.

And he was.

Even if it scared the shit out of him.

He hadn't told another living soul about this. He had a pretty good idea of what might happen if he did.

Like the cynic he was, Kurt also entertained the possibility that this might all be a scam - a way to extort $500 out of a grieving widower, willing to pay anything to have his husband back. Except he had to admit that the old woman – possibly a hundred or so years older than God – put on a convincing act of being afraid for the paltry total of $500 considering what the granddaughter had described of their financial straits.

They probably could have gotten a thousand out of him easily.

Kurt killed the radio when he turned off the highway, not wanting to alert the whole neighborhood to his arrival.

He loved his house – fell in love with it the first moment he laid eyes on it - but that's when it was about to become a home.

Now, it was simply a tomb. A mausoleum.

What would the home owner's association think if they knew he was harboring a corpse in his bedroom without their permission?

When he had left earlier in the day, he had neglected to leave on any of the lights. It seemed fitting to keep the place dark while his husband's body lay within, but now he wished he had left one light on at least – or a flashlight by the door. As he opened the door and peered into the pitch black living room, he waited, holding his breath, half-expecting his husband's naked corpse to meet him at the entryway.

He chided himself for being such a ridiculous idiot, though, how ridiculous was it really?

A day ago, when he was searching SoHo shops for that horrid incense that Sebastian used to love in hopes of keeping his husband's favorite scent alive in the house, he would have agreed that the thought of life after death was ridiculous. That was until he stumbled on a teenaged girl who promised him the secret to bringing Sebastian back.

"Se—Sebastian?" Kurt called out, weak, hoping that his dead husband really wouldn't answer. Kurt was thirty steps away from walking out of his comfort zone and into a world he would have rather not known existed. Sebastian coming back to life all on his own would tip Kurt over the edge into insanity.

Kurt reached out a trembling hand and turned on the light. His living room, warm and comforting, decorated in subtle muted browns with shabby chic inspired elements, welcomed him. Nothing odd or out-of-place.

Nothing dead.

Kurt continued on to the bedroom, switching on lights as he went. With each step further in toward the bedroom he had to convince himself to keep going. He originally pictured himself racing into the house, eager to get this started, but now, alone, with reality staring him in the face, he wasn't sure.

He didn't have the luxury of waiting to see if he would eventually change his mind. Sebastian's internal organs, especially his brain, were decaying fast, regardless of how much ice or air conditioning he piped into the place.

Twenty steps brought him to the threshold of his bedroom, where he stood, staring at the closed door.

Kurt reached down and patted the bottle in his pocket, feeling the lump through the denim of his jeans. Kurt moved to the doorknob but stopped with his hand hovering in the air when he heard a small creak – like a foot stepping lightly on the hardwood floor. The house settling, Kurt reassured himself. That's what Sebastian always said when Kurt woke in the middle of the night to the sound of odd creaking and whining.

"It's a mid-century house," he had said. "The floors contract in the cold and expand in the heat."

"What does that mean?" Kurt asked.

"It means the house talks in our sleep," Sebastian replied without opening his eyes. "Now go back to sleep."

"Just the house settling," Kurt muttered, taking the thought from his mind and saying it out loud to make it real. "Nothing else alive in the house except for me."

Still, Kurt couldn't bring himself to open the door.

He heard the creak again.

"Sebastian?" Kurt called out again. "Are you there? Are you…are you waiting for me, baby?"

Of course he's waiting for you, Kurt thought. He's waiting for you to grow a pair and get this over with.

Kurt sighed, allowing the rush of breath in his deflating body to give his hand momentum, to touch the doorknob and open it like he had hundreds of times before.

This time was no different.

He turned the knob and switched on the light without thinking about the sight that awaited him on the bed. When his eyes flicked up and saw him, Kurt almost fell to the floor.

Sebastian – his body lying in bed, eyes closed. He looked asleep, and from this distance, normal except for a few cuts and bruises on his gorgeous face. The accident hadn't really banged his body up all that badly.

It was his severed neck from the whiplash onto the steering wheel that had killed him instantly.

He had been leaning forward in his car seat, looking at street signs, stuck on a small, offshoot road that the GPS in his car had apparently never heard of before. He had entered the intersection of the suburban street slowly when the other car flew through out of nowhere and hit him from behind. Sebastian hit the steering wheel, ironically, half a second before the air bag deployed.

Kurt blinked back the tears that automatically leapt to his eyes at the thought of the accident that took his husband from him.

"H—hey, baby," Kurt said, gathering his senses, trying to get comfortable with the idea of talking to his husband again. "I went out shopping today, and you'll never believe what I brought home."

Kurt could see his own breath as it met the atmosphere of the room, making what he was doing that much more morbid. His knees knocked as he clamped them together, trying to keep his weak legs mobile. He reached the bed and his casual, conversational tone disappeared, the words wavering as he spoke.

"I think…this might…help…" he hiccupped, side-eying his husband's body. His skin looked waxy and wet from the ice and the frigid air, and the color wasn't right. Kurt knew that soon the blood would pool and Sebastian's pallor would turn black, so he had to hurry, but every muscle in his body screamed for him to turn around and run.

Kurt touched the bed and whimpered.

I can do this, I can do this… he chanted in his head. He reached out a hand and let it brush Sebastian's fingers. He tried to recall their warmth, their touch on his skin, the way his touch made him feel loved, beautiful, desired.

Kurt wanted that back.

And he wasn't going to let anything stand in his way.

Kurt turned and knelt on the bed. He crawled over to Sebastian's body and leaned over his peaceful face.

"I'm going to get you back," Kurt whispered, cursing the sound of fear in his voice. "If I have to go to heaven or hell and bring you back myself."

Kurt reached into his pocket and pulled out the blue bottle. He held it to the light again and gave it a little swirl, watching the liquid spin around the stomach of the glass and then settle into a shimmering mass.

Kurt pulled out the stopper and brought the bottle up to Sebastian's lips.

"Bottoms up, love," Kurt whispered, pecking a small kiss to cold skin and then tipping the contents into his mouth. Kurt expected to see Sebastian's throat move as he swallowed, but it didn't. For now, he was still dead…but not for long.

Kurt knelt beside Sebastian's side, staring down into his husband's face, heeding the ancient woman's words to be the first person Sebastian saw when he opened his eyes. He knelt and knelt for over an hour, the thought that this was all an elaborately planned and executed hoax becoming more a likelihood as time passed by.

The neighborhood outside started to become light. Kurt could barely see the rays of the sun seep in beneath the blackout curtains, but there it was – evidence of a brand new day - and still there was no change, no sign, nothing on Sebastian's face that might give Kurt a reason to hold on. He struggled against exhaustion, grasping at thin straws of hope, but he was failing.

It had been a dream – a wonderful dream.

But Kurt had to wake up and face facts that his husband wasn't coming back to him in any form.

Kurt stretched his limbs - one leg, than the other. Then he lifted up his torso, bending his arms and flexing his hands. He crawled backward off the bed and stood, raising his arms above his head, listening to his spine snap and pop. He looked at Sebastian again – one last look before he made his plans for his husband's burial.

Kurt walked to his dresser and opened the top drawer, looking for his pajamas. Before he did anything, he needed a nap or he would drop dead on his feet.

He winced at the ill-placed pun.

He rummaged through the drawer, looking past perfectly suitable pairs of shirts and lounge pants, for what he did not know…until he found it.

A journal.

He hadn't written in it since his father was diagnosed with cancer. In its pages were written everything that ever tried to knock him down a peg, anything that ever tried to bring him to his knees. There were entries about his mother's death, Karofsky's bullying, Blaine's betrayal. It was a way for him to cope with the horrible things that happened in his life. Not till that moment had he considered it ironic that he only wrote down the bad stuff and didn't keep track of the good. He should have kept albums full of all the amazing memories – winning Nationals, getting into NYADA, marrying Sebastian.

He swore that someday he would buy a journal and fill it with all the happy events in his life, but he had this one with him now, so he might as well write another entry – one more moment of pain to add to the list.

Kurt felt numb to everything around him, and not just because of the incredibly pervasive cold. Nothing seemed to matter now. He left his pajamas in the drawer and hopped back up onto the bed. There was nothing for him here to fear. What lay in bed before him was a body, nothing more - flesh and blood rotting from the inside with no beautiful soul to keep it all together and make it worth something.

He opened the journal to an empty page, where a blue ballpoint pen was shoved into the spine, waiting for him. He picked the pen out and uncapped it, putting the pen to the paper and trying to decide what to write. Where should he start? A few minutes ago when Kurt decided to give up on the thought of his husband coming back? A couple of hours ago when the old woman almost refused to sell him the potion? Or that horrible night when the police showed up at his door with forlorn looks and bad news?

While Kurt tried to decide, he heard the melting ice-cubes collapse in their piles where some had turned to water and made way for others to fall. He felt the bed dip slightly as he shifted his legs beneath him, his crossed limbs falling asleep in their bent up position. He heard a murmur as he cleared his throat, the sound rumbling in his chest, though the voice didn't exactly sound like his own.

Even in the cold room, he felt his blood turn to ice. He didn't think he could get any colder, but he did. That inside out feeling returned, along with another one starting to register.

He no longer felt quite so alone.

Kurt lowered his journal, glancing up from the blank page to find Sebastian, rolled onto his side, staring at him with wide, pale eyes.

January 15 –

He opened his eyes and looked at me, but the eyes I remember are gone. Gone are the beautiful grass green eyes I loved so much. These new eyes are white on white, the pupils infinitely dark and the irises torn. They stare. They don't blink. These eyes look at me, but they don't seem to recognize me. I don't want to reject him, but those eyes unnerve me.

There's so much about them that's innocent and frightened.

There's so much about them that's desolate and dead.

We literally spent the morning looking at one another.

I would give anything to know what was going on in his mind.

I want to reach out and touch him, but I'm afraid. I know he won't feel the same. He won't be warm. What could be worse than feeling his skin after he was dead? I don't know. But whatever this is, it might be worse. And he won't smell like Sebastian. He won't have his snarky attitude or his beautiful singing voice. It's almost as if I adopted some wild animal and made it my husband.

What have I done?

January 16 –

All day long, he tried to move, grunting with the effort of struggling to stand up and get out of bed. He didn't speak words; he just groaned. I want to help him. I want to pretend that he's simply convalescing after a horrible illness. I want to bathe him and dress him. I want to sit him down in front of the television, prop up his feet, and feed him soup and ice-cream. I want to put this chapter behind us and get on with our lives.

I want to make-believe him dying never happened, but I'm not that good an actor.

He's behaving the way the old woman warned me he would. He's like a child – a grown, mentally disabled child.

This is the 'in sickness and in health' part of the marriage package, which I agreed to without hesitation.

Never mind the 'till death do us part' portion.

These are my vows and I'll honor them.

My love will help him, I know it will.

…

Can I really do this, or am I fooling myself?

January 17 –

I'm trying my best to take the bad with the good.

I managed to get him to the living room sofa. He moved his legs stiffly. He couldn't seem to bend his knees.

He had been declared dead on arrival because of the injury to his neck, but now I'm wondering if anything else is broken. I wasn't really paying attention to the mortician when he went over the extent of Sebastian's injuries. After I heard the word 'dead', I kind of tuned out.

I should get a copy of that report.

But if his legs are broken, how will I deal with that? Will the potion magically fix everything? I mean, it brought him back to life. Could fixing broken legs be more difficult than that? What is the extent of its effects?

Maybe I should call the old shopkeeper back and ask.

We'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

He stumbled numerous times and fell on me. I did my best not to cringe at his touch or accidentally drop him, but those eyes, so close to mine, were like looking into a nightmare. I could almost see through them.

The fourth time he stumbled, though, I had the feeling that maybe he was falling on purpose.

I even thought I saw the shadow of a smile cross his lips.

I watched him carefully as he sat in front of the TV and renewed his passion for The Speed Channel. There was a show about Ferraris on. They were always his favorite.

He sat so still. He didn't swallow. He didn't appear to breathe.

The only time he moved was when he looked over to where I sat to make sure, I think, that I was still there.

He sat for hours and watched those shows. There was nothing else for him to do.

I fed him salad for dinner. I let him stay in front of the television. I didn't see any real reason to move him. He leaned down and sniffed the cold lettuce leaves, but he didn't eat it.

Neither did I.

January 19 –

After a full day of limping him around the house, Sebastian is surprisingly steady on his feet. He can make it from the bedroom to the living room sofa by himself. It takes him a while, but he can do it.

His body is still stiff, but he seems to be getting more comfortable with it.

I should be jumping for joy at his progress, but I don't know that I'm all that comfortable with it.

January 21 -

He doesn't sleep, and now that he doesn't rely on me to get around the house, neither do I. I know that he sees me almost as a parent and that he won't hurt me, but he's such an alien creature. Not like the old Sebastian at all.

It's strange having him around the house.

When Sebastian was

Before the accident, Sebastian was so independent. He worked even though with his trust fund he really didn't have to. On his days off, he had tons of projects that kept him busy. He almost didn't need me. But now, he needs to be near me all the time.

I understood there would be a change, but it's such a striking change that it's difficult to get used to.

I took a shower for the first time in days. I left him in the living room watching the TV, but when I was finished and opened the curtain, there he was, standing there…staring.

I fell asleep for about an hour afterward and when I woke up, he was kneeling beside me, again staring at me.

He's always staring.

What does he see when he looks at me?

January 22 –

I finally broke down and gave Sebastian a shower. He didn't necessarily stink but there was something about him, something that smelled…well, I can't describe it here. I just wanted it gone.

I had seen the injuries to his front but I hadn't paid much attention to his back.

When I saw them, I almost threw up.

And he noticed. He heard me gag and he turned, and for the first time he had an expression on his face that was different from his normal blank one…or even from that almost imperceptible smile I thought I saw when I was helping him walk around the house.

I gasped, holding in my urge to be sick, and he turned his neck to look at me.

He looked hurt.

January 27 -

Each day that he improves, I debate telling his family, but in the end it would be too cruel. He's not entirely himself anymore. He never will be. Most times I curse myself for doing this to him. My motives were selfish. I wasn't thinking of anyone but myself when I made the decision to bring him back. I wasn't thinking of his family.

I wasn't even thinking of him.

Our lives are unrecognizable. We'll probably never travel the world like we planned. We'll never have children. Our entire lives will be here, in this house, and I have to be just fine with that.

But what about Sebastian?

If you asked me logically if I think he really wants to live this half-life, no potential to be anything other than a walking human puppet who only barely resembles the man that was Sebastian Smythe, I would have to say no.

Absolutely not, but I can't turn back now.

I can only hope that my love for him is enough to keep him from hating me when he's able to comprehend completely what I've done to him.

February 1 –

I've finally gotten him to eat – little bits and pieces, mostly small bites of vegetables and corners of bread. It doesn't look like he likes it, but he eats it, and that's good. He eats because I tell him to. It shows that he trusts me.

He's more self-sufficient now. He showers himself and brushes his teeth. He picks out his pajamas and dresses himself. Sometimes he tries his hand at making the bed. He's trying to be more vocal, but he has yet to say a single thing that isn't a grunt or a moan. I've been looking up the subject of speech delay on the internet, trying to find ways to help him learn. I started making him flashcards, but I don't even know if he can read.

February 3 –

I tried calling that shop in SoHo to ask about the total effects of the potion, but the phone has been disconnected.

I guess they went out of business after all.

It doesn't matter. Nothing appears to be broken, or maybe it's just that he doesn't feel pain.

I was trying to teach him how to cook. I had him grating cheese. He ran the grater over the back of his fingers, scraping off skin, but he didn't even flinch. I think it bothered me more than it bothered him. I bandaged it up, and without thinking I kissed the wound. I looked up at him in utter shock…

…and he smiled.

It's so nice to see his smile back. I never thought I would.

February 4 –

I took off Sebastian's bandage, and his bruise from the cheese grater is completely gone. There's not a single trace of it left. I guess that answers that question.

I should be relieved, but it bothers me, and I don't know why.

February 14 –

Today was the most unexpectedly intense, depressing and wonderful day all at once.

It started when Sebastian woke up this morning. He got up before me and tried to make me breakfast. I had no idea why. He hadn't tried before. He burned it, and himself, and almost the house along with it. The fire alarm woke me up, blaring in my ears. I managed to get to the fire extinguisher in time, but poor Sebastian looked heartbroken over his blackened toast and undercooked eggs.

Then, before lunch, he wanted to go outside. I think he was trying to sneak out in secret but I caught him jiggling the front doorknob (he has yet to master the lock…thank you to whoever I should thank). When I caught him, he slammed his hand on the door, and sprinted for the back door. I followed him, knowing it was locked and that he wouldn't be able to go outside. When I reached the back door, he was trying to wedge his way out of the old dog door (I don't know why we have it. We've never actually owned a dog, but there's one in the kitchen, too). I patted him gently on the back and asked him what he needed. He stood up and groaned, moving his mouth, wiggling his tongue, making nonsensical sounds, but when he couldn't say what he needed to say, he pointed out the window to the garden. I shrugged. I told him I didn't understand, and he pointed again, jabbing at the window with his index finger.

"I don't…I don't understand," I said. "Do you want to go outside for a walk?"

I had taken him outside a few times, when the neighborhood kids were at school and I didn't think anyone would notice us. I wrapped him up in a full length coat and scarf with just his eyes peeking out. I guess he enjoyed it, but he never really asked to go outside before. He shook his head and pointed again, this time at the dying rose bushes that I hadn't time to deadhead yet. I didn't get it. I shrugged again and he stormed off, to the bedroom this time.

I followed him, but he locked the door.

I could hear him inside moaning and groaning. It was horrible. It sounded like pain and embarrassment and frustration all rolled together, and I couldn't help him.

He wouldn't let me.

I tried to lure him out several times, but he didn't come out till dinner time.

He was dressed in his black Armani suit.

It was the suit I had planned to bury him in.

It threw me for a loop, dragging me kicking and screaming back to that day when I found out he was dead, before I decided to try bringing him back, before I knew that I could. I took out the suit to air it. I guess I hadn't put it back into storage because there it was, standing before me, with the living corpse of my husband inside.

It took all the air out of my lungs.

"Take it off," I said quietly, trying not to alarm him, but how was I supposed to explain to my somewhat dead husband that I didn't want to see him dressed in the suit I planned on putting him in the ground in?

He looked confused and he shook his head, opening his mouth and groaning.

"Please, Sebastian," I begged, hoping he would hear my anguish, "take it off."

He stomped his foot and shook his head, just the way a petulant, disobedient child would. It should have been cute, but I couldn't handle it. I have had so many problems with his disturbing looks before, but for the first time since he came back to me, he truly looked dead.

"Take it off!" I screamed, and I ran at him, swinging and screaming, grabbing at the lapels, trying to tear it off his body. He held me, held my arms, and I could feel his renewed strength in his hands.

I hadn't really let him touch me before, but now I knew that if he wanted to, he could probably hurt me.

I stared up at him, realizing that he was hovering above me and that I was lying on my back, prone on the floor. My heart stopped. He had never looked menacing before. Even in death, he seemed so innocent, but now, he looked like a monster. He had a piece of paper balled in his grasp and he tried to make me look at it, but I couldn't take my eyes away from his face – pale and cold and lifeless, regardless of the fact that he was my Sebastian. He stared at me, trying to speak.

And that's exactly what he was doing. He was trying to speak.

His lips were moving in exaggerated, grotesque ways that shouldn't be able to turn sound into words, but they were.

"K…Kr…Ku…"

Sebastian blinked and shook his head.

"Kur…"

"Kurt?" I asked, awed and breathless that he was actually trying to say my name.

Sebastian laughed. It was a glorious, hollow, frankly frightening sound, but I couldn't help smiling when I heard it. He put his fingers to my lips. I guess he didn't want me to steal his thunder.

"Kurrrt," he said, smacking his lips. "I…lo…I lov…" Sebastian swallowed again, closing his eyes, trying to make the words in his head match the movement of his lips. "I…love…you…Kurrrrt."

Sebastian tapped again at the paper on the floor, and this time I did what he wanted and looked. He had torn off the current page from the calendar and poked at a box circled shakily in red. I peered down at it.

I could have cried.

"Valentine's Day?" I asked, looking back at his pale, broken eyes, and he sighed, nodding.

It was Valentine's Day.

He wanted to make me breakfast in bed…for Valentine's Day.

He wanted to get me roses…for Valentine's Day.

My husband wanted to do something nice for me…on Valentine's Day.

I hate Valentine's Day, with every last fiber of my being, but my husband spent all day teaching himself how to say, "I love you, Kurt," because there was nothing else he could do for me.

So, now Valentine's Day is my new favorite holiday.

June 4 -

Five months…ish. It's been five months and we've made it! Despite the odds. Despite the difficulties and the heartache. Despite every time I thought about giving up, here we are. Happy. Together. We spend out days wrapped in each other's arms. We watch TV. We read books. It might not be what it was before, but it's perfect. Since we've made headway using foundation on his skin and contact lenses for his eyes (in a darker shade of green than his original alluring moss, but it will do), we've even managed to go outside more. His vocabulary has expanded immensely, and even a hint of the old snark is coming back.

I am finally at a point where I am optimistic about the future.

Finally, it seems like there might actually be one for us.

August 13 –

I woke up this morning to a strange screaming/squealing noise. Sebastian wasn't lying beside me in bed, which isn't so unusual. He's normally the first one up on any given day, and I'll just curl up back into a ball holding his pillow to my chest until he returns.

He always returns.

Even the squealing wasn't really weird. I've thought for the last few months that we might have rats. I think I've heard that same squealing a few times before.

This time, instead of returning to bed, I decided I wanted to make some waffles for breakfast, so I walked out into the kitchen.

Sebastian was there.

Crouching on the floor.

Covered in blood.

Biting into the spine of what used to be a live raccoon…

…

I may have a problem.