Once upon a time I told myself I would post all my oneshots over here. Oops. So have this one, which I wrote about 4 months ago.

The Fourth Time
He hadn't moved in hours, still laying in the exact same position in their bed that he had woken up in. He was facing the bedside table and missing the customary warmth on his back.

He hadn't realized at first, when he was slowly dragging himself into consciousness, that everything had changed. It wasn't uncommon to wake up alone to the sound of the shower already running of else a whistling coming from the kitchen and the smell of fresh coffee wafting down the hall.

But this time it had been quiet. And when his eyes had fluttered open in groggy confusion the first thing they saw was the glint of sunlight as it reflected off gemstones.

Sebastian's ring, identical to his own, was curled around a piece of paper he couldn't bring himself to read and the emeralds were winking innocently up at him.

But he had known by the suddenly suffocating stillness.

After 15 years of friendship, three years of dating, and six months of (what he had naively considered) engaged bliss, Sebastian Smythe was gone.

And although every fiber of him knew it was undeniably true, he didn't understand.
They shared everything. They had been happy. They had loved each other since they were children and they were deeply in love as adults.

182 days ago Sebastian had knelt down and asked Blaine to marry him without even a trace of hesitance in his eyes.

Not that Blaine had seen, anyways. (And he had thought he knew Sebastian well enough that he saw everything.)

Not this though. This he had never seen coming.

Distantly he could hear his phone ringing but he didn't move. Moving would be like admitting this was happening.

The ringing stopped and once again they apartment was filled with echoing silence.
After a minute the ringing stared up again.

Blaine wasn't moving.

The Third Time
Ever since they had transferred to Dalton there had been something different about Sebastian. He was quiet in a way he had never been before, not even after his parent's divorce. There was something that he was going out of his way to keep from Blaine.

The circumstances surrounding their transfer had been less than ideal. Blaine, who had been tentatively working his way out of the closet, had been jumped at a school dance because he had gone with the only other gay boy at school. His arm had been broken and he needed almost 40 stitches in total. The Anderson's hadn't even signed the hospital release papers before they had submitted his transfer ones. And Sebastian had been very vocal about boycotting school unless he, too, was allowed to go to Dalton. (He had also nearly pitched a fit when they weren't allowed to room together. But that came down to Dalton policy since Blaine, as a freshman, would be relegated to the freshman dorms.)

Blaine knew that Sebastian largely blamed himself for what had happened. The only reason Blaine went with Lucas was because Sebastian hadn't wanted to go.

But this, whatever this was, wasn't about that.

Sebastian wasn't someone who could ever be pushed into telling anyone anything. That was a lesson he had continuously learned. The result of pushing frequently being a radio silence that lasted for weeks.

So he let Sebastian soak and stew in whatever it was. Quietly watching for the signs that it was getting to be too much to handle, because at that point he would have to step in.

Finally, after two months, Blaine's patience paid off.

They had just returned to Blaine's room from another grueling Warbler rehearsal. The plan had been to pick out a movie and spend the next two hours not thinking about either choreography or harmonies. Normally Sebastian was very vocal about what he wanted to watch but every suggestion Blaine made was greeted by he same nonchalant response.

"What about Titanic?"

"Sure."

Blaine sighed and put the movies down. Not only was Titanic Sebastian's least favorite movie ever, the only way Blaine ever got him to watch it was by crying. He turned back to his bed only to find his best friend curled up in a defensive ball in the middle of it.

"Stop looking at me," he snapped.

Blaine ducked his head but didn't divert his attention. With slow, measured movements he made his way to the bed and perched himself on the edge of it. He reached out a hand and grasped one of Sebastian's in it, curling their fingers together and offering a gentle squeeze.

Feebly Sebastian tried to pull away, but Blaine's grip was determined and strong.

For nearly 10 minutes they sat in silence.

"I'm gay." It was said with a clenched jaw and a defiant glare as though daring Blaine (of all people) to hate him for it.

Immediately Blaine felt his heart flutter but he pushed the feeling away. Having been in love with his best friend for two years he occasionally fantasized about this moment and… The fact that it was actually happening left his head spinning.

He remembered his own fumbling coming out. They'd been walking home from the park and he spent a good five minutes spluttering about before Sebastian told him to 'just spit it out already, B'.

This wasn't anything like that and Blaine had no idea what to say. Sebastian should know that he supported him. It would be hypocritical of him not to. But clearly it was a big deal to the other boy so he needed to say something. Couldn't just nod and smile like it was nothing.

"Okay. That's okay." he said slowly, his own mind trying to sort through what it was feeling. "I. You know I don't care. Not that it doesn't matter. I just… I mean, you know I am too. And if you've been scared, because of my attack," his voice wavered on the word but he plowed on because this was more important than that, "you shouldn't be. It's not all like that. Especially at Dalton."

"I'm not scared," Sebastian spat out defensively enough that Blaine knew he was. And no one could blame him for it. Seeing your best friend hospitalized for a something you were struggling to understand about yourself would be terrifying for anyone.

He wanted to ask how long he had known and why this was the first time Blaine was even getting a hint about it. And what about Tiffani, and Kat, and Court, and Ellie? Sure, Sebastian had never claimed love with any of them, but he certainly boasted about the sex enough. And as horrific as those questions were, the one that came spewing out was somehow worse.

"Does…" he swallowed around it, knowing he shouldn't ask but being completely unable to stop himself. "-Have you told anyone else?"

"I assume Nick knows." Sebastian replied with only a hint of guilt. His brow was still furrowed and his shoulder still tensed, as though just waiting for the hammer to fall. "I would guess the enthusiasm with which I suck his cock made something click."

Blaine liked Nick and he supposed if Sebastian had to be messing around with anyone that Nick was a good choice. He was loyal but not clingy and probably not looking for anything too serious. Perfect for Sebastian, really who, after the disastrous way he and Ellie ended had sworn off relationships altogether.

Despite knowing that, Blaine couldn't help the hot twisting that was curdling his stomach. He had never been jealous of Sebastian's girlfriends before, not really. When he had thought Sebastian was straight his unrequited crush was just another misfortune in his unlucky love life. But suddenly there was potential there. Potential that he had never even dared hope for before.

And still Sebastian had chosen someone else.

It hurt. More than he ever imagined it would.

The Second Time
Her name was Tiffani Lemay. (Her name is actually spelt Tiffany, but she changed it in the 5th grade so she could dot the last letter with a perfectly drawn heart.) Her hair was a shocking shade of blonde that everyone would have thought was dyed if they hadn't known her since they were four. She wore scandalously short shorts and low cut tops that meant everyone was able to see the progress of her rapidly developing cleavage. She was also the first girl in their grade to start wearing makeup on a daily basis.

Insofar as Blaine knew Tiffani and Sebastian hadn't had a full conversation since she 'accidentally' knocked over his orange juice in the 3rd grade after he had beaten her at the spelling bee.

It was understandable then that when Sebastian came bounding up to him in the hallway between 3rd and 4th period and announced that he and Tiff were dating, the first thing Blaine said was 'I'm sorry, what?'

"I overheard Scott telling Jason that Lizzy was told by Casey that Tiffani said she liked me. So I asked her out today during shop," Sebastian repeated patiently, unable to wipe the maniac grin off his face. As if to reiterate the point, Tiffani came slinking up behind them and wrapped her arm possessively around Blaine's best friend.

"Hey, baby," she said in what she probably imagined was a seductive tone but actually sounded like she had a hairball.

"Hey," Sebastian replied with an easy smirk. "You remember Blaine?"

She smiled at him, tight lipped and disinterested.

He tried to return it with a bit more kindness, but the sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach made it difficult to do anything but grimace.

Sebastian was too busy looking down her shirt to notice.

Without even saying bye, Tiffani started pulling Sebastian up the hallway (in the complete opposite direction of his next class). Just before they turned the corner Blaine watched as he slipped her hand in his back pocket.

He didn't yet know why his he felt sick every time he stumbled across them kissing and giggling over each other in the hallways or, even worse, why he wanted to cry when Sebastian called him at 10.30 one Tuesday in February to gloating tell him about how she had given him a blow job. (And really, he wasn't actually sure what that meant. Just that she had been touching him in places and that Sebastian had ended that conversation with a confession of, 'I think I might love her.')

That he was jealous and wanted to be in her place didn't cross his mind for years. All he knew was that every time her name was mentioned with that smile of sickening adoration he felt like his heart was being torn out.

The First Time
Blaine and Sebastian had been practically inseparable since the day they had met. Whenever people talked about them it wasn't Blaine and Sebastian, it was BlaineandSebastian. A single, unbreakable entity.

No one even commented on their age difference anymore. Not since Sebastian had punched Joe Webster in the jaw for saying he was a baby for hanging out with a first grader all the time.

Everyone went around claiming that they were BFFs with everyone else but when it came to BlaineandSebastian everyone actually believed it.

So when Sebastian looked up the slide at where his best friend was standing and called up, "Hey, B. We should get married," absolutely no one was surprised. Sebastian already cut all of the crusts off Blaine's sandwiches at lunch time (Mrs. Anderson refused 'for nutritional reasons' no matter how hard he pleaded). Really, there were only so many directions their friendship could go from there.

Blaine hurtled down the slide landing neatly on his feet and looking up into Sebastian's face. "Okay," he agreed. "But you have to ask me properly."

"Properly?" Sebastian looked weary.

"Yeah. Down on one knee and with a ring. And there should be angels singing in the background."

Sebastian cocked his head contemplatively. "Hold on."

He spent the next ten minutes frantically running around the playground while Blaine wandered over to the blacktop and practiced skipping rope with Lillian and Julia. Finally Sebastian came running back over, red in the face and sweating but looking very pleased. Following behind him were the blonde haired Bishop twins. As always they looked faintly terrified to be crossing the yard because their fashion choices tended towards white dresses and perfect patent leather white shoes that they feared getting dirty.

Gesturing at them, Sebastian sunk down on one knee. The twins began warbling out (a little out of tune and off rhythm) a church hymn.

With a level of seriousness only a 7 year old can achieve, Sebastian asked "Blaine Devon Anderson, will you marry me?" He reached into his pocket and pulled out the ring he had created and held it up.

Blaine took the ring and looked it over. It was made of braided grass and where there would normally be a gem stone instead there was dandelion. With equal seriousness, Blaine nodded his head and slipped the ring onto his finger.

"Cool." Sebastian stood up and brushed the dirt off his leg, dismissing the Bishop girls with a wave of his hand.

For the rest of recess Blaine ran around showing everyone his new ring. Even Mrs. Kinney was impressed, although she looked critically between the two boys.

The next day Blaine was still excited about his impending marriage and spent all of recess planning the details of it with Sebastian. It would be a summer wedding so they could go swimming afterwards and for dinner the guests good choose between mac and cheese, pepperoni pizza, and cotton candy. The cake would be batman themed, although they'd get a cupcake with a princess crown for Sebastian's little sister. After lengthy discussion they decided Rachel would be the flower girl (because 'she's bright like a sunflower, duh,' Blaine snorted) and Puck wasn't allowed to carry the rings because he would probably steal them.

"We need a song."

"What for?" Sebastian looked up from where he had been drawing an epic battle scene in the sandbox.

"I dunno." Blaine chewed his lip. "So whenever we hear it we can remember we're married. But we don't have to make funny faces at each other when we hear it." Blaine made a face. "That's gross."

"Alright then." When it came to all things romantic Blaine knew much more than Sebastian did. Sebastian really only had a vague idea of romance and, after his mom had explained it as 'it's about making the person you love happy', he mostly equated it with eating chicken fingers while watching cartoons. Blaine had told him maybe it could count if the chicken fingers were shared but he looked skeptical about that. "You can pick it."

"You Are My Sunshine," Blaine said promptly. It was his absolute favorite song because Sebastian sometimes called him sunshine, so it was a song all about him and how he made Sebastian happy. (Not that he would ever, ever tell the other boy that. Sentimentality really wasn't his best friend's thing.)

"That's not a wedding song," scoffed Sebastian. "Have you ever even heard it?"

"Of course I have!"

Sebastian rolled his eyes. "Listen again. You'll see."

The first thing Blaine did when he got home was ask his mother for the CD it was on. Then he went up to his room, dragged out his CD player and listened to it.

He got to the end of the song and listened to it again. And then a third time, just to make sure he heard it right. He took the disc out the player and chucked it against the wall before throwing himself on his bed.

He was still crying when his dad came up to get him for dinner and through his hiccups all he was able to explain was that the whole entire universe was a lie, all of his dreams had been shattered, and it was all Sebastian's fault.

(And the one time he healed it)
For most children the 45 minutes flowing lunch were the best part of the day as they raced around the playground chasing after each other and taking turns jumping off the swings. Sebastian Smythe was at his third elementary school in three years and the raucous shouts of children had become a surprising comfort to him. Something familiar in an unfamiliar world.

It was a week after he started at his latest (and last, his father had promised) new school when he spotted a curly haired, too neatly, and absolutely tiny boy curled against the brick wall of the school, clumsily thumbing his way through a book almost as big as his head and crying.

Generally Sebastian didn't deal with crying. Whether it was his sister, his mother or other children, tears were something best left to others.

But after twenty minutes had passed and no one approached the distraught boy he decided to take it upon himself to see what was wrong.

"You shouldn't get books wet, you know," he said conversationally. "It makes the ink run and the paper go crumbly."

The boy looked up, snot and tears mixing together in a disgusting mixture on his face that dripped down the front of his shirt and onto a ridiculous red and gold stripped bowtie.

"Sorry," the small boy sniffled, immediately rubbing at his face in embarrassment.

Sliding down the wall so he sat with his left arm barely brushing the other boy, Sebastian craned his neck to see what the other boy was reading.

In an attempt to be helpful, he tried to lift the book to fully show Sebastian the title, but it proved to be too heavy for him. Instead he carefully brushed off a spot on the ground and laid it down between them.

"What's a dec-line?" Sebastian asked after a long moment of staring at the embossed golden letters.

"I think it's like a fall."

"But they say that," he pointed at next words in the title. "That's stupid."

The boy started crying again. "I-I d-d-on't know. N-n-none of it makes any sense."

"Why are your reading it then?" The kid looked like he just barely belonged in kindergarten. Even Sebastian's sister had never had to read anything like that for class. And she was in the seventh grade.

"For my grandpa," he said voice barely above a whisper but calmer than it had been since they started talking. "He always wanted to read it. He left off here." He flipped the book back open to a dog-eared and stained page less than a quarter of the way through the book.

Sebastian didn't need to asked why his grandfather wasn't finishing the task himself. "I'm sorry."

"Now I have to finish it for him. Because no one else will." As his face crumbled again he kicked his legs out in frustration.

"Everyone says I'm a really good reader," offered Sebastian carefully. "I'm the only kid in my class to read a whole, entire chap'er book." It had been 40 pages and eleven chapters, took him three days to finish, and to date it was his proudest accomplishment. "I could help? Maybe if you want?"

"You would do that?"

It wasn't until that moment that Sebastian had realized exactly how golden his new friend's eyes were. He swallowed heavily, unable to look away. "Yeah."

"Blaine!" A high pitched voice echoed across the playground as a blonde haired girl came hurtling at them. "Recess is over. Didn't you hear the whistle?"

"See you tomorrow then?" Sebastian pushed himself up and stood awkwardly off to the side. His class still had another five minutes before they went in.

"Tomorrow," Blaine echoed, looking shyly down at his feet while the blonde girl looked on curiously.

Every day for the rest of the school year Blaine and Sebastian met at the same spot and poured over the book together. It was slow going and some days they didn't even get a page finished either because the passage was too hard or, later, because they were too busy talking about other things.

And Sebastian would never, ever forget the first day they made it through an entire recess without Blaine crying and, even better, the first time he really, truly, genuinely laughed, smile bright enough to rival the sun. (Not a particular feat on that day as it had been overcast for the better part of the last two weeks, but still.Still.)

When their five year friend-iversary coincided with the first summer Sebastian spent in Paris, Blaine scrimped and saved up his allowance (and eventually begged Cooper to help) so he could buy his friend his own copy. No one really understood the proud smile on his face as he presented them, pristinely wrapped and perfectly tied

For the rest of his life Sebastian would sleep with the increasingly tattered books within reaching distance of his pillow.