A/N: Warning of anxiety and minor drunkenness.

"What do you mean, dad was right?" Sebastian asked. "Why…why would we put her in a home? Isn't that part of what this was – taking back control so we could protect mom?"

Stuck in the middle of a room whirling with suffocating emotions, filling up the air around them like water in a tank, ready to pull them down and drown them together, Kurt didn't know where to focus - on Sebastian, who looked like he might simultaneously punch his brother in the face and curl into a ball and cry; on Richard, who stood boldly in the face of this man who he loved and respected, who only recently came back into his life, knowing that there was a possibility Sebastian might explode; or Tabitha, who stared at Sebastian with pleading eyes, eyes that reflected his pain. Kurt took a step back so he could see all three, as confused as Sebastian as to what was going on, as weary as Richard with the drama of the evening, which for him must have been ongoing for the past few months, and as concerned as Tabitha for the two brothers in this face off, ready to offer comfort where needed.

"You're right," Richard said, staying centered even though his stance screamed exhaustion, his eyes drooping in the corners with a need to shut, to surrender to sleep and finally end this day. "We are going to protect mom, and I promise you, this is the best decision."

"I don't…I don't understand," Sebastian said, not able to shake the stammer in his voice. "What are you saying? You…we did all this for nothing? He still wins?"

Sebastian took a step forward, but Richard didn't take a step back – much like their father. The difference was Sebastian was begging Richard – begging for an explanation. Richard didn't want to intimidate his brother. He wanted to be there for him.

"No, he doesn't win." Richard sighed. "Sebastian, you haven't seen her. When you left, things went downhill fast."

Sebastian's eyelids narrowed.

"Explain downhill?"

Richard dropped his eyes, pressing his fingers to his brow.

"She's regressing," Richard explained. "Disoriented. When it started, things were okay because she was still fairly lucid, but now…" Richard shook his head.

"Well, fuck it," Sebastian said. "We'll hire in-home care. A full staff of nurses, doctors, whatever she needs. We can take care of her right here." Richard shook his head more but Sebastian didn't stop. He thought he had hit on the solution, and Kurt cringed, knowing it wasn't that simple - knowing that Sebastian knew it, too. "She needs to be with family, Ricky. That's the best thing for her."

"We tried that," Richard said, lifting his eyes from the floor. "It worked for a little while, but the more her mind slipped away, the harder it was for her to be here. This house is big and confusing. She got lost a couple of times and it frightened her. Being here, it's not…it's not what she wants…" Sebastian furrowed his brow, but Richard didn't explain. "Look, Sebastian, I'm not dad, alright? I'm not leaving her out on a street corner. She's going to a place…a nice place. It's nothing like the home dad was going to dump her in." Richard took a pause to catch his breath. "Besides, it wasn't my decision."

"It's not what she wants, it wasn't my decision…" Sebastian mimicked, tossing the words back into his brother's face. "Then whose decision was it? Who's pulling the strings here, Ricky?"

"Mom," Richard answered, the single word dropping in among them like a grenade with the pin pulled, the four of them waiting for it to go off.

"Explain," Sebastian demanded, not asking anymore, no longer begging. He had enough of this. He felt too far out of the loop, estranged. He and his mom had always been thicker than thieves, but now he felt like an outsider in her life.

Kurt looked at Richard and his heart went out to the man. He looked so done, so ready to call it quits. Kurt wanted to take Sebastian's arm and pull him away, convince him that they could wait till tomorrow for the answers to these questions, but that wouldn't be fair – not to the man who drove them for hours straight, at midnight, so Kurt could be reunited with his dad.

"While I was investigating the company's accounts, I started checking into the family's personal accounts as well. I didn't just hire a forensic accountant, I hired a lawyer - an outside guy, an old friend from school, someone who didn't have any loyalty to the business or our family, who wouldn't feel a need to report back to dad with what we found. Turns out, mom had a lawyer, too. Someone off the books as well – a man who had been trying to convince mom to leave dad for years."

Sebastian's shocked face screwed up in the most awkward way.

"Was mom…cheating?" Sebastian stepped headlong into the land of double-standards with that question, but he couldn't help the slip. He wouldn't begrudge his mother happiness if she found it in the arms of another person. His father had been finding happiness between the legs of other women for years. Still this was his mom they were talking about – his moral, ethical, upstanding, church-going mother - and her having a relationship outside of her marriage, even a shitty marriage, was kind of a creepy thing to think about.

"No," Richard laughed. He wasn't about to judge his brother. Maybe he had entertained the same thought and had the same reaction. "They were old friends. She hired him to protect her interests, and ours, in case dad pulled something asinine…like he did with you."

"So, how does finding this lawyer guy play into mom wanting to be in a home?"

"She filed a living will." Richard moved away to a far corner of the room where a brown leather briefcase sat propped against the wall. Richard picked it up, carried it to the desk, and opened it, pulling out a blue file folder and bringing it back over to Sebastian. "She didn't tell dad about it. Her lawyer was supposed to tell us about it in the event of her death, but when the Alzheimer's started to progress rapidly, mom lost touch with the guy."

Sebastian opened the file and flipped through the document inside. Logically, he understood it, every word of it. He saw the provisions for her care, recommendations with regard to the homes she chose to spend her last days (she actually had first, second, and third choices), her assets outlined in detail, even down to the deed to the plot where she wanted to be buried (she had chosen to be cremated and have her ashes shipped to her family's country estate in France instead of the Smythe Mausoleum in Pioneer Cemetery there in Westerville).

"Heartland Manor Hospice and Retirement Community," Sebastian read with a nod and a lump in his throat. Kurt heard Sebastian's voice tremble, tears threatening. It wasn't obvious, but Kurt knew it in that way that somebody who has heard a person in pain before knows. "At this home? Is that where she is now?"

"Yes," Richard said, resting his hands on his hips. "We intercepted dad at his attempt to send her to some dump in Columbus and we got her admitted to the first facility on her list." Richard chuckled humorlessly. "I don't think dad even knows. We're going tomorrow to finalize some things. I think you should come and visit." Richard saw the objection in his brother's eyes and added, "I think that you and Kurt should both come."

The room went silent. So many silences, so many things left unsaid, so many emotions not completely realized, and it was tearing Sebastian and his brother apart. Maybe not from each other – they shared a bond after their previous ordeals that transcended friendship – but inside. Even standing perfectly still, piece by piece was tearing off and falling away.

Looking at Sebastian, Kurt started to see the holes forming.

Sebastian stared at the living will in his hands, but he had stopped turning the pages. Kurt didn't think that he was reading it anymore, just looking at it, trying to make sense of the words in front of him even as the letters bled together and stopped looking like words anymore.

"Alright," he said, closing the file and handing it to Richard. Richard held it to his chest; Tabitha folded her arms around him from behind. "Alright, we'll go with you. If…if that's alright with you." Sebastian turned his head and looked at Kurt. "Kurt? Is that alright?"

Kurt saw the intense sadness in Sebastian's eyes, felt it in his chest when Sebastian's gaze caught his eyes – a sadness that no words had any chance of capturing.

"Of course," Kurt said. "Of course, it's alright."

"Great." Richard clapped a hand on Sebastian's shoulder, and on a microscopic level, Sebastian flinched. Sebastian reached out an arm to his side. Kurt didn't see it, he felt it. He felt the tremor of movement when it hit the air. Kurt reached back and took his hand.

"I…" Sebastian said the single word and then whatever came after it stopped. Whatever the rest of that sentence was, it disappeared. "We should go. It's late."

"Of course," Richard said, offering his brother a small, tired smile. It was sincere, and that's all that mattered. "Will you be staying here or…"

"Yes," Sebastian said, cutting Richard short, needing to go. "We're staying here."

Richard nodded, but neither man moved to leave. Tabitha unwound her arms from her husband's torso and Richard looked immediately bereft. She approached Kurt and Sebastian and hugged them both together, pulling Kurt in close to wrap her arms around them.

"I'm so glad you're both here," she said in a well-practiced voice, one that hid her tears. It might have seemed like a bizarre thing to say considering, but she didn't mean I'm glad you came to dinner, or it was nice to see you. She meant thank you for supporting my husband. Thank you for being strong when we needed you. The last few months must have been hell in the Smythe household for Richard to handle without his brother. Kurt couldn't even imagine it.

He couldn't imagine it, because he couldn't imagine a family who – at its roots – wasn't all about love.

Kurt couldn't think of an appropriate response. Anytime didn't fit. Neither did thank you for inviting us, or let's do this again sometime. So he held her tighter, held her longer.

Kurt didn't feel Sebastian hug them back, but he didn't take it as a slight.

It didn't seem like Sebastian was even able to move.

"We should…we should go," Sebastian said. He didn't sound convinced. Kurt didn't think that Sebastian knew what he should do.

"Yeah," Kurt agreed, gently pulling out of Tabitha's hug. "We should go."

"Well, then, we'll see you guys tomorrow," Richard said, eyes lingering on his brother's face, then on Kurt's. "It was very nice to meet you," he said, extending a hand for Kurt to shake. "An honor, really."

"Thank you," Kurt replied, shaking Richard's hand, embarrassed by the fuss Tabitha and Richard made over him. "It was nice finally putting a face to the name. We'll see you tomorrow."

Kurt took Sebastian's hand and pulled him away. Sebastian walked with him, using Kurt's momentum to move, but he didn't speak. If Kurt had to put a description to his expression, he would say blank. Sebastian looked blank, as if his conversation with Richard had erased him, his every emotion wiped away. Kurt had no idea where they were going. Sebastian's room? Somewhere in the house? When they stepped through the doorway and out into the hall, Sebastian revived, enough, at least, to lead the way.

"So, where is your room?" Kurt asked, starting mindless conversation, hoping to bring his boyfriend back. This catatonic state of Sebastian's unnerved Kurt. Kurt knew something about shutting people out. He had done it to Sebastian not too long ago. Maybe turnabout was fair play but Kurt didn't think he was strong enough to handle it. He wasn't strong in the same way Sebastian was strong.

If Sebastian blocked him out, Kurt wouldn't be able to take it.

"We have to…we have to drive there," Sebastian said.

"Drive?" Kurt asked.

"Yeah." Sebastian took Kurt's elbow and put an arm around his waist. "There's, uh, a way of getting there through the house, but driving is actually faster." Sebastian's steps quickened the closer they got to the front door until he was sprinting for it, reaching out for the doorknob and grabbing it before the butler could open it for them. Kurt smiled at the startled older man, who stopped hurrying toward them when Sebastian opened the door. Suddenly they were outside – out in the dark and the chill air, which seemed hugely more inviting than a single room of that enviable house.

Sebastian slowed his steps as they approached his car but he was in no less of a hurry. Now that they were outside, he breathed easier, as if he had been holding his breath for four straight hours. He pulled out his keys and unlocked the car, but he stopped at opening the door.

"Hey, gorgeous?" Sebastian said, his hand resting on the door handle. "Would you mind driving?"

Kurt snapped his head up and stared at Sebastian with such an absurd expression, Sebastian laughed out loud.

"Me?" Kurt asked, at a loss for words. If Sebastian wanted to knock Kurt completely for a loop, that question did it. It might have actually beaten out the marriage conversation for shock value. That Porsche was Sebastian's baby. Yes, in perspective, it was just a car, and with the amount of money that Sebastian had, he could buy two or three more, even in the same limited edition style and color. This car meant something more to Sebastian. Kurt saw it in Sebastian's eyes every time he looked at it, every time he sat in it - every time he turned the key in the ignition, curled his fingers around the steering wheel, and settled into the driver's seat. That Porsche brought Sebastian serenity. Kurt could almost be justified feeling jealous of it.

And here Sebastian was handing over the keys.

Kurt knew that Sebastian trusted him, that eventually he would let Kurt drive it, but not tonight. Not after all of that emotional upheaval. Driving his Porsche struck Kurt as the kind of thing that Sebastian might need to do to unwind after such a stressful evening. Kurt didn't think he could be anymore stunned if Sebastian had asked Kurt to punch him in the nose.

"Yeah," Sebastian chuckled, raising a hand and rubbing the back of his neck. "After all the wine and the…I don't think I can drive. It would be embarrassing as hell to get into an accident here. Ricky would never let me live it down. Would you mind?" He tossed Kurt the keys. Kurt snatched them in mid-air. "Go ahead, gorgeous. I trust you."

Kurt stared at the keys in his hand with those words echoing in his ears, a brief memory of the day his father handed him the keys to his first vehicle – a Lincoln Navigator – filling his thoughts, along with him saying those same three words - I trust you. Kurt had been so excited, so thrilled. That Navigator meant the world to him, and not because it was an exceptional vehicle, which it was. It was a symbol that his father trusted him, that he thought of Kurt as an adult, a man who could handle responsibility.

It was Kurt's ticket to the next stage of his life – and to freedom. In a way, it had bought him his freedom.

It was the thing he sold to get the money he needed to get away from Dave.

Kurt could see this Porsche being kind of the same. It took Sebastian away from his father, from the life he didn't want to live, from the responsibilities he didn't want to inherit, but it didn't take him too far. It always brought him back home – back to his brother and his mom.

"Of course I'll drive," Kurt said, trying not to sound too excited under the circumstances. "I'm totally okay to…yup, let's…yeah…" He left off with a giddy laugh, wishing his dad could be there to see him drive a Porsche Cayman S. Sebastian smiled at his boyfriend, at the adorable way Kurt rushed to open the passenger door for him, the same way Sebastian had done for Kurt many times. Sebastian slid into the passenger's seat. It felt weird. He'd never sat in it before. But watching Kurt hop into the driver's seat, smiling softly to himself as he buckled himself in, Sebastian knew he could get used to the view from here. He was glad that one person's night could be saved, even this tiny bit.

Kurt turned the key in the ignition carefully, not wanting to accidentally gun the engine, assuming the Porsche would be temperamental and sensitive – kind of like its owner. But it growled softly from the very first touch, and that moan Kurt couldn't help when he was riding in the passenger seat came back as he toed the gas pedal.

"You like that?" Sebastian asked, the tone of his voice close to suggestive even if his eyes and his heart were a million miles away.

"Oh, yeah," Kurt sighed, throwing the car into gear. "I can so get used to this."

"Well, someday I've got to take you out to the track," Sebastian said, pulling out his iPhone and opening a browser window. "Let you open her up."

"There's a race track in Westerville?" Kurt asked, the idea thrilling him more than it should at the moment.

"Nah, we've got one here on the estate," Sebastian answered idly, focused on his phone. "My dad's got a whole stable of V8s and V12s…or, he did…"

Kurt nodded, biting his tongue to hold it. In the throes of driving a Porsche and preoccupied with making small talk, Kurt was about to ask Sebastian what his dad did with those cars, since Sebastian talked about them in the past tense.

It's not the cars that had gone missing, Kurt realized, but Sebastian's dad. As of an hour ago, Cornelius had taken Sebastian's place as persona non grata.

Kurt kept his mind on the road in front of him and lost himself as best he could in the experience of driving a luxury sports car. Sebastian, eyes glued to his iPhone, managed to direct Kurt, pointing when he needed to turn or simply muttering left, right, straight at the appropriate times. Kurt didn't want to invade Sebastian's privacy, but in the dark, Kurt saw the reflection of Sebastian's phone screen clear as anything on the Porsche's windshield. The writing was too small to read, but Kurt knew what Sebastian was looking up.

Heartland Manor Hospice and Retirement Community.

Sebastian wanted to see the home where Richard had taken their mother.

Kurt wanted to pull the car over and wrap his arms around Sebastian's neck, kiss him until the entire evening turned into a far and forgotten memory, but he figured best to get them back to Sebastian's room and spend the night making this up to him, even if it wasn't Kurt's responsibility.

Kurt hadn't fully appreciated how large the Smythe estate was until they left the main house to go to Sebastian's room. Correction. Not his room, his wing - the part of the estate where he lived from his pre-teen years to adulthood. How lonely must it have been for Sebastian, as a young man, to live so far from his family?

Apparently, banishment in the Smythe household was a rule, not an exception.

"So, this…this is it?" Kurt asked, pulling up in front of a section that looked much like the front except that the front door was shorter and less grand. That was it – the only real difference. If Kurt didn't know better, he might assume that this was the front of the house. Sebastian peeked up from his phone.

"Yup," Sebastian confirmed, eyes switching back to the screen. "This is it. Mi casa."

"And this is where you lived from when again?"

"Oh, I don't know." Sebastian pocketed his phone. "Twelve? Thirteen?"

Kurt didn't believe it. Sebastian could repeat it a thousand times and Kurt still wouldn't believe it. Some people might have called Sebastian lucky, having an entire wing of an enormous mansion to himself at such a young age, having that freedom, playing at being an adult, but Kurt saw it as sad. This had to be the decision of his father, but what about his mother? Forcing her son into isolation like that didn't coincide with everything Kurt knew about her - the admittedly little he knew about her, but he thought he had a good picture of the way she treated her children.

That picture became somewhat sullied by the reality that stood in front of him.

Kurt had to believe that if she did agree to this, there had to be a reason. He hoped that Sebastian would tell him, but for now his questions would have to remain unanswered.

Sebastian climbed out of the car before Kurt, pressing the button that popped the trunk on the fob hanging from the ignition. He walked to the rear of the Porsche and pulled out their bags.

"I could ring for the butler on this side of the house," Sebastian said, hauling Kurt's bag out as Kurt reached for it, not letting him take it, "but I don't want to be a dick. It would take him a while to get here from the main house."

"No," Kurt said, locking up the car and following behind. "No, don't be a dick."

Sebastian smirked, putting the bags down and unlocking the front door.

"I'll try not to," he said, pushing the door open and standing back for Kurt to walk through.

This part of the house was nearly an exact replica of the main house, but scaled down, which made for some disorientation on Kurt's part. It felt like stepping through the doorway to a parallel dimension. The foyer they stood in and the hall in front of them were furnished the same, decorated the same, painted in the same color scheme, accented with the same molding, the same mirrors hanging on the walls. The artwork would have been identical, too, Kurt guessed, if Cornelius could have raised the masters from the dead to paint copies. Whoever he had hired to decorate managed to find paintings similar – floral scenes and landscapes in complimentary styles.

"Yeah," Sebastian said, locking the front door, "kind of freaky, huh?"

Apparently, Sebastian knew what Kurt had been thinking.

"But, why?" Kurt asked, walking with Sebastian as he led the way down the hall to a door on the right.

"Because my dad's a control freak and a megalomaniac," Sebastian said, shrugging. "He likes to have things his way, even if they don't directly affect him. But now that he's out of the picture, I might hire someone to come in and re-do it the way I've always wanted it."

"Why?" Kurt asked, curious if Sebastian's plans included eventually living here. If they were planning a life together, would Kurt get a say? Kurt probably wouldn't mind living in Westerville. It would be fairly close to his father. But he hadn't pictured himself coming back to Ohio, regardless of his knee-jerk reaction from their first night in Lima.

"Because I can," Sebastian said, putting down his bag to open the door, "but mostly out of spite."

The door opened and Sebastian entered first, allowing Kurt as much time as he wanted to take the room in.

Kurt needed it.

Kurt hadn't really understood what Sebastian having his own wing of the estate entailed. He had expected to see a bedroom when Sebastian opened the door – somewhat like his own but ten times the size. But this wasn't just a bedroom shoved in the way back of the house and forgotten, like a dreary dungeon or a prison cell. This was a whole apartment. The door opened on to a spacious living room with a vaulted ceiling. Looking up Kurt could see another floor above them, accessible by a winding staircase to his left. From where he stood, he saw a polished wood railing cordoning the upper level off like a balcony, and on that balcony sat a baby grand piano. He pictured Sebastian sitting at it, playing in the early morning after breakfast, or in the evening before they retired to bed, filling the air with music, and suddenly the idea of living here became immensely more attractive.

In the living room, a wrap-around couch of cream colored leather sat in the middle of a cherry maple wood floor. Kurt walked straight to it, reaching out a hand to touch it. It kind of called him to it, supple and butter soft, the kind of couch that would suck you down into it and be reluctant to let go. A rectangular coffee table sat in front of it – a gilded brass frame holding a single pane of glass, elegant in its simplicity. A vibrantly woven Persian rug lay underneath the coffee table, protecting the wood floor. Kurt had seen Persian rugs before, but they had mostly been expensive knock-offs that definitely looked the part but with none of the spirit that authentic rugs had. This rug was an explosion of finely crafted patterns and precisely matched threads set against a background of russet wine. Gazing down on it, Kurt tried to identify every individual shade of thread, but when he reached thirty separate and distinct colors, he had to stop. Running a toe delicately over the fringe, Kurt gaped in awe at this masterpiece.

"That rug belonged to my mother," Sebastian commented. "She inherited it from her father. If my dad had his way, it would be hanging on a wall, but my mom insisted I have it in here."

Kurt took off his shoes as he listened, afraid of accidentally snagging the gorgeous carpet and ruining it. He walked in a circle, taking in the room and its decor – walls of pale beige, ceiling to floor picture windows that looked out on the property, framed by curtains of pecan brown, simple scrolled molding outlining the ceiling and baseboards, the overall effect exquisitely subtle. A flat-screen TV was mounted on the wall across from the couch and a low cabinet beneath it probably housed DVDs and such, but other than that, there was very little furniture in the room, functional or otherwise. Someone had gone to a lot of trouble to make this room minimalist, crisp and clean, impersonal to a fault.

Kurt felt certain that the living room of the main house looked exactly this way.

"There's a kitchenette down that hall," Sebastian said, motioning in a direction behind Kurt. Kurt turned and saw a small hallway with a door at the end, closed shut. "I've never really used it. I usually ate with my mother."

His mother, not his parents. Kurt filed away that piece of information, as he had started to do with every new thing he learned about Sebastian on this trip.

Sebastian walked past Kurt, heading left – the side of the room with the winding staircase – to a pair of French doors, each set with frosted glass in their frames.

"These doors over here," Sebastian said, "lead to my bedroom."

Sebastian opened both doors together, letting them swing to a stop on their own. Kurt watched Sebastian carry their bags in and set them on the bed before he stepped through.

What he walked into – the bedroom Sebastian occupied for a good six years at least – did not look like an average kid's bedroom. Well, of course not. Not with the amount of money the Smythes had. But it wasn't a kid's room, either. It had the same minimalist feel as the living room, the same frugality of décor, without a single touch of childhood to be seen. The bottom half of the walls were dark wood, polished till they gleamed, the top half painted a matte forest green. The furniture – a bed, an end table, a desk and chair, a dresser - matched the wood on the walls, stained deep and with a mirror's finish, soaking up the light, giving the room a shadowy aura, a feeling that there would never be enough lamps to lighten the dim. There were paintings on these walls, too (Cornelius definitely made use of his investments) – a Picasso, a Monet, a Mondrian, a Dumas – each one authentic as far as Kurt could tell, but none of the artists' more renowned works, nothing a collector would clamber over for anything other than the signature on the canvas, lost to little for being hidden away in a child's bedroom. It was hard to believe that any kid would be comfortable here. Kurt could possibly picture a seventeen- or eighteen-year-old Sebastian in here, but a twelve-year-old Sebastian? A Sebastian who loved sports and photography and travel?

This room didn't have the floor to ceiling windows that the living room did, but it did have three large windows and a set of French doors with clear glass panes obscured by light green curtains. Kurt could see a sliver of glass from a part in them, but nothing of the outside.

The one personal touch Kurt could see – if it could even be labeled a personal touch – were Sebastian's books. Sebastian had bookcase after bookcase flooded with books, like Kurt had in his room, but where Kurt's books were mostly autobiographies, programs, and musical scores, Sebastian's collection encompassed a mass of varied genres – non-fiction, fiction, sci-fi, every Steven King novel ever written, textbooks from Harvard on business, business law, accounting, and a bunch of old paperbacks printed in French by 19th-Century authors such as Balzac, Flaubert, Sand, and Michelet.

"What?" Kurt asked, peeking back at Sebastian with a mischievous smile. "No mysteries?"

Sebastian walked up to the bookcase. He scanned the books on the shelf in front of Kurt. "A-ha. Here." He slid out a hardcover book and handed it to Kurt. Bereft of its original dust jacket, the cover was an odd shade of mustard yellow, with the title written across the front in black letters.

"Encyclopedia Brown, Boy Detective?" Kurt chuckled.

"Don't laugh. That kid was the shit," Sebastian chided. "Besides…my mom bought it for me." Sebastian glanced at the book in Kurt's hands, nostalgia brimming in his somber green eyes.

Kurt nodded with understanding. He turned the book over in his hands, running gentle fingers down the loose spine, eying the yellowing edges of the pages. The book looked like it had been read to death, which would explain the spine splitting from the binding. He opened the book to the middle, feeling the weight of it in his hands the way it would have felt to a young Sebastian, opening it for the first time. He turned to the cover page to check out the table of contents. It had been a lifetime since Kurt cracked open an Encyclopedia Brown book, but his experience with the series was more forced to read for school than sentimental gift from a beloved parent. Flipping to the beginning, Kurt saw an inscription in the left corner of the front cover, written in blue ink –

Pour mon fils bien-aimé,

Tu dois continuer à rêver de toutes tes forces.

Je crois en toi.

Je t'aime.

Maman

To my beloved son,

You've got to keep believing with all your strength.

I believe in you.

I love you.

Mom

The dedication brought tears to Kurt's eyes. What could have happened to Sebastian to inspire such words? Kurt felt Sebastian's eyes on him, concerned over his silence. Kurt closed the book, returning it to its spot in the bookcase. Kurt moved down the line of shelves. Sebastian had managed to make this one space his own through photographs. Framed pictures stood scattered around – school pictures, team pictures, show choir pictures, Sebastian's mom when she was pregnant, a plethora featuring Sebastian and his mom together, Sebastian and his brother, Sebastian with his mom and brother, but of all the family photos there was only one that included his father, and it was tucked in the back behind other pictures, out of sight.

"Is this you?" Kurt asked, picking up a frame that held a lacrosse team photograph. He looked at the teenaged boys mugging for the camera, some with goofy smiles, and one with a signature smirk that Kurt had memorized.

It felt weird seeing that same exact smirk from this handsome young boy on the man who had fucked him earlier.

"Yeah," Sebastian laughed, looking over Kurt's shoulder. "That's me alright…and that's Christian." Sebastian jabbed a finger square on the face of a blond boy standing in the back. He looked older than Sebastian in the photo, and about as cocky, though Sebastian's face had a certain innocence to it – an innocence that was lost in other photographs with later dates displayed. Kurt could see the appeal. Christian was handsome in a kind of Abercrombie and Fitch, President of the Young Republicans, Captain of the Debate Team, representing the U.S. in the Model U.N. sort of way, but underneath that lurked a stuck-up trust fund baby who thought he could have anyone he wanted wrapped around his finger.

He had Sebastian there once, then he hurt and humiliated him.

Kurt knew that was in the past, but still, he hated this boy immediately.

Kurt put the frame down and looked from photograph to photograph, noticing how Sebastian changed over time, how his smile became more confident but less sincere, his eyes jaded. Sebastian said that he played Christian's game of deflowering boys all through high school – that he excelled at it. Kurt wondered how many of the boys in these pictures felt the same way about Sebastian that Sebastian felt about Christian.

It gave Kurt pause, made him question why Sebastian would keep these pictures on display. Could he really be such a narcissist that the boys he may have hurt didn't matter to him? It made Kurt shudder. No, he thought. Not his Sebastian. But then it hit him that the Sebastian who put these pictures up wasn't his Sebastian. He was a boy trying with all his might to meet his father's demands, to make a man that he despised proud. By those standards, these boys could have been trophies to Sebastian.

Or they could be reminders of a person he no longer wanted to be.

Kurt had kept his ghosts in a separate room with its own locked door. Sebastian kept his with him, out in the open, in his sight every day, slept beneath their eyes.

Kurt picked up another – this one of Sebastian with his mother and brother. She was a beautiful woman – not because of her wavy dark hair, her flawless complexion, or her impossible trim figure after two kids. She glowed with a kindness and compassion that these photographs blessedly captured, though it was more evident in the photos where she had her two true loves with her – her boys – than in the photos of Sebastian's mother alone. Kurt peered at the photograph, looking from Sebastian's face, to Richard's face, to their mother's face, and realized he had been wrong. He was wrong when he thought Sebastian had his father's cynical green eyes. Sebastian actually had his mother's eyes – thoughtful, intelligent, with a smile that hid itself in plain sight, luring everyone in, daring them to try and find it.

In Richard's face, Kurt saw traces of their father, but he didn't see their mother at all.

"If you want to hang up your stuff, you can take some space in the closet, gorgeous."

"Hmm?" Kurt bounced back from the photograph – from the mother and her sons beaming at him, dressed in clothes suitable for fall, standing in front of a scenic lake, trees nearby changing their coat of colors. "What was that?"

"I said if you want to hang up your clothes, you can have some space in the closet." Sebastian walked to a door between the bookcases and opened it. Lights inside turned on automatically. Kurt peeked in, trying not to act surprised, but his reaction was inevitable. This wasn't an ordinary closet. It was the closet of Kurt's dreams - a whole other room devoted solely to the storage of clothes.

"You have a walk-in closet?" Kurt asked, rushing in for inspection.

"Yeah," Sebastian answered sheepishly. "It's kind of required when you're rich. You know, to store all your useless shit in."

"Bite your tongue. Clothes aren't useless," Kurt called back. He walked the length of the closet from one end to the other, then from left to right, marveling at the space. "Oh my God! I think this is about the size of my first loft! You could seriously live in here!" Kurt heard Sebastian laugh from outside, but he didn't follow Kurt in. Kurt gave himself the tour, hoping to thumb through retro ensembles from Sebastian's sordid past, but the closet seemed practically bare except for the floor, cluttered (in an organized sort of way) with well-used sports equipment – skis, snowboards, a surfboard, helmets of all kinds, a pyramid of lacrosse equipment, and soccer balls, basketballs, and volleyballs, scuffed but kept clean, lined up in a row. But as for actual clothes, there was astonishingly little – navy blue blazers hung beside grey slacks (school uniforms, Kurt assumed, since they were identical to the ones in the photographs), a single row of jeans, another of polos, button-up shirts, some suits in garment bags. Sebastian had more designer label clothes than Kurt had ever owned, but in comparison to the room it was stored in, in comparison to what Kurt had expected, it seemed lacking. "Did you take everything with you when you left? Your closet's almost empty." Kurt felt it a safe question. Sebastian's father might have thrown the clothes out when he disowned his son, but then why leave Sebastian's other personal items?

"I wasn't all that into clothes too much when I was a teenager, to tell you the truth," Sebastian answered, still not coming in. "I attended a school that had uniforms and I lived in my practice clothes. Some guys I hung out with were really into clothes so I knew about designers and stuff, but other than that, it wasn't my thing."

"Well, if you had gone out with me in high school, it would have been your thing," Kurt said, appraising what little clothing Sebastian had hanging in his closet.

Sebastian smiled at the comment, but he couldn't bring himself to agree, because the boy he was in those photographs, unfortunately, would have made it his life's mission to make teenaged Kurt's life miserable.

Sebastian finally peeked in, needing to see his boyfriend and the cute way he was probably judging his past fashion sense. He caught Kurt holding a Marc Jacobs shirt up to his torso in front of a full-length mirror.

"I know it's not up to snuff, but feel free to borrow anything you'd like."

"I intend to," Kurt responded, twisting to get a better view from a different angle. Sebastian laughed.

"Of course you did."

Kurt wandered out of the closet minutes later carrying some choice items with him when he caught sight of something right in the doorway he hadn't noticed on his way in.

"You had a mini-fridge?" Mini-fridge was kind of an understatement. It wasn't a full-sized refrigerator, but it came up to Kurt's chest – and it was stainless steel. On a cabinet above it sat a convection oven. "But, you have a kitchenette."

"Yeah, but that's all the way down the hall. Completely inconvenient placement for late night burrito and root beer snacking."

Sebastian made a joke out of it, but Kurt had a hard time finding it funny. Factor in the various servants the Smythe family employed and theoretically Sebastian would never have to leave his wing.

He'd never have to see a single member of the household.

Or more specifically, they would never have to see him.

Kurt wanted to travel back in time, hunt down teenaged Sebastian, and hug him for all he was worth.

Sebastian walked into the closet and opened the refrigerator door. It was plugged in and cold, and completely empty. Even though it was easy to see that there was nothing in it, he looked from shelf to shelf, then bent over to open the crisper drawers, searching for something. When he didn't find it, he closed the door, then opened up the cabinet below the convection oven. It was empty, too, except for one thing – an unopened bottle of Courvoisier. Sebastian grabbed the bottle by the neck and pulled it from the cabinet. He held it up so Kurt could see the etched word on the bottom of the glass.

"L'Essence," Sebastian read, tilting the bottle underneath the light, admiring the clarity of the amber liquid inside the pristinely cut crystal shaped like a teardrop.

"I'm not really a liquor drinker," Kurt admitted. Sebastian raised a skeptical brow, recalling the one time he saw Kurt drink himself sick off a bottle of Tequila. Kurt wasn't in the mood to reminisce, especially considering that night's connection to Blaine, so he let Sebastian's snide expression slide. "Is it any good?"

"It should be. It goes for about $3,000 a bottle."

Kurt nearly choked. The last time he splurged on a bottle of liquor, it cost around $50, and that's because it came in a bottle that looked like a Mexican sugar skull.

Yes, he bought fifty dollar Tequila because the bottle looked like a skull. He had no regrets.

But $3,000? Kurt could buy a used car for $3,000!

"My dad bought this for me when I got into Harvard," Sebastian continued, unaware of Kurt's inner turmoil over the high price of liquor. "He said we would open it when I graduated and took over the business."

Sebastian shook his head, lowering the bottle and putting it back on its lonely shelf in the empty cabinet.

Revelation after revelation, Kurt started seeing Sebastian in a different light. His boyfriend wasn't just an incredible guy who was brave and loyal and seemed to be utterly in love with him. He was a brilliant and talented adventure-seeker. He was an athlete. He was a dedicated son and brother. He was a privileged rich kid with daddy issues. He was a troubled teenager and the product of a broken home, even if that break might not be obvious to the casual outside observer.

But inside, Sebastian was the little boy who shaved his father's cats, begging for attention and approval he was never going to get.

"There was something else I wanted to show you," Sebastian said, running a hand down the cabinet door that held the bottle of liquor inside.

"Okay." Kurt gave Sebastian his brightest smile, hoping to lift the fog of sad that was descending quickly over them. He hung the clothes in his arms on a hook by the door and trailed behind Sebastian as they walked back into the bedroom. Sebastian led Kurt to the curtained French doors. He pulled the curtains apart and gestured for Kurt to open them.

"This is where I used to do my homework," Sebastian said, watching Kurt turn the lever door knobs. "Where I used to sit and read, and watch the sunset."

Kurt opened the double doors to what he knew would be a balcony. From the way Sebastian sounded, Kurt assumed this might be the heart of his room, the place he went to get away from it all, maybe the spot where he spent most of his time. Kurt opened the doors and took a step out, knowing before he saw it fully that it would be extravagant, but again, his imagination didn't do it justice.

Kurt had been on one other balcony before, at a hotel in New York that he went to for a photo session with Vogue. The balcony was maybe ten feet by ten feet, and looked out over midtown Manhattan. Kurt wasn't all that impressed by urban views, but he remembered it was nice - nice to be able to step outside and take breather, take a break from high-maintenance photographers and models. Everyone else used the small space to smoke cigarettes. By the end of the afternoon, it stank like an ashtray.

Still, it was nice.

Sebastian's balcony was much more than nice. It was glorious. A wrought iron railing surrounded a cobbled stone extension that jutted out and rounded at the edge, following the architecture of the house. It stretched from almost the front edge of this wing on the right to Sebastian's first window on the left, and furnished with wicker patio furniture - a futon with a red mattress cover, a round table and chairs, even a small barbecue.

A barbecue within twenty feet of the bedroom? That's a design feature Kurt knew his dad could really get behind. When the sun came up, he'd have to snap a picture and text it to him.

"Oh my God," Kurt said for the fiftieth time that night, their romp in the coat closet notwithstanding. "You had this growing up? I had a bench seat next to a box window, and the window didn't even open."

"Yeah, it was pretty nice," Sebastian said, breathing in the night air with the slip of a smile making an appearance on his face.

"Did you and your friends party out here?" Kurt asked. He walked to the railing and leaned over an inch, perusing the estate, seeing if he could catch a glimpse of the race track Sebastian mentioned.

"Nah," Sebastian said, strolling up behind him. "I wasn't a fan of bringing people home. No one from school's ever been in my room. Besides, I didn't need parties to make myself popular."

Kurt understood Sebastian's insinuation. He knew why Sebastian was popular. He didn't like to think about it.

"Do you want to know one of my favorite parts about it?" Sebastian asked.

"Hmm, what?" Kurt closed his eyes and let the chill breeze kiss his skin. He felt Sebastian come up behind him, felt warmth surround him as Sebastian put his arms around his waist.

"That's her garden," Sebastian said quietly. Kurt opened his eyes, following Sebastian's gaze to a sectioned-off patch of green among the grass in front of them. Kurt had to narrow his eyelids to see it. It was overgrown – a tangled mass of weeds and unruly rose bushes – but Kurt could make out the once carefully tended rows, the ordered division of plants and flowers and vines that once bore vegetables and fruit. "She was out there every day – weeding it, watering it. It was her greatest source of joy, besides us kids." Sebastian sighed, the heat of his mouth caressing Kurt's skin as he spoke and breathed. "When she started to forget, it turned into that. My dad could have had our gardener take care of it, keep it going for her, or tear it out and replace it with fescue. It would have been simple, but this…this is a message." Sebastian chuckled dryly. "Probably for me. I mean, I'm the only one who can see this. It's one last dig. One last way to show that he's the big man on campus."

Kurt had heard Sebastian use that term before with regard to his father. How often had Cornelius hammered that into his son's skull? How much did that shape who Sebastian was today? Did he spend more time living up to his father's expectations, or living them down?

How much did Sebastian respect himself?

Kurt looked at the tract of land and couldn't help picturing his own garden at its peak, full of ripe tomatoes, peppers, and melons, and flowers in an array of spring and summer colors, growing almost to his stomach where he could gather them together without bending and put them in vases on every flat surface of his house. That picture faded, replaced by an image of the way his garden looked the last time he saw it - sliced to pieces, ruined, destroyed by someone else's anger, envy, and hate. When he first laid eyes on the destruction of his precious garden, of the thing he poured his love and affection into when he had no one to give that love to, before he had Sebastian, it felt as if someone had torn out a piece of his heart.

That's what this was – someone else's hate tearing out a piece of Sebastian's heart.

Sebastian left Kurt's side and walked back into the room. Kurt watched him go, followed him slowly, surprised that Sebastian hadn't passed out yet right where he stood. Sebastian dropped down onto the bed, staring at his hands in his lap. He looked smaller than usual – his shoulders and his head bent, his spine bowed, like a maranta leukoneura, closing up for the night. With a deep sigh, he reached for Kurt, knowing without raising his head that Kurt would be there. Kurt walked into Sebastian's room and closed the double doors, walked straight into Sebastian's embrace and let his boyfriend pull him down into his lap, let Sebastian squeeze him a little too tight.

"You feel like calling it a night?" Sebastian asked with his head against Kurt's chest.

"Yeah," Kurt said, kissing the top of Sebastian's head.

"Bathroom's through that door if you want to take a shower," Sebastian said, pointing in a vague direction. "I'd join you but…I'm not really up for it."

"That's alright," Kurt said. "To tell you the truth, neither am I. Besides, it wouldn't be the same without you."

"Yeah," Sebastian agreed softly. Sebastian sounded so worn down, so ready to pack it in. It made Kurt's heart ache.

"I still owe you a blowjob," Kurt reminded him. "You want it? It might take the edge off."

Sebastian inhaled in and then out again. He peeked up at Kurt and kissed his neck.

"Raincheck?" he said sadly. "I don't have the energy for anything right now. I'm sorry."

"No," Kurt said, rocking Sebastian gently. "Don't be sorry." Kurt felt Sebastian lean into him, felt him try to melt against him, but there was some invisible barrier erected that he couldn't get past. "You know, everything's going to be alright," Kurt whispered. "Whatever happens, we'll get through it together, the way we've gotten through everything, okay? Side by side."

Kurt didn't hear Sebastian respond, didn't feel him nod, and for a second he thought his boyfriend had fallen asleep.

"Promise?" Sebastian finally murmured, his voice shaky.

Kurt squeezed Sebastian tight, feeling that it was too little too late, but there was nothing else he could do.

"I promise," Kurt said, burying his nose in Sebastian's hair to hide his own shaky voice. "You jump, I jump. I promise."


Kurt was asleep – he was sure he was – but he wasn't dreaming. He had knocked out quickly and was doing his best not to dream. He couldn't always control it, but it was something he had started working on long ago. It wasn't the ghosts of the past that he was evading this time. They took a back seat to everything else that had happened that evening. Kurt didn't want to relive the conversation from earlier. He didn't want to re-see a distasteful Cornelius ribbing and jabbing his son. He didn't want to remember the look of horror on Sebastian's face when he found out his mom was in a home. He just wanted to leave the angst of the night behind them and move on – move on with life and hope and joy.

He wanted to make Sebastian happy again.

But in the darkness he had so coveted, he felt something pulling him awake – tugging at him with the hem of his shirt climbing up his stomach and the waistband of his pants creeping down his legs. Kurt sucked in a breath and the smell of alcohol filled his nostrils.

He held his breath.

It can't be. He can't be back there. He just can't be.

He stopped himself – stopped everything – and tried to think, followed the steps he'd taught himself (steps he learned from a website Sebastian found for him about dealing with anxiety and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) to center himself and calm down.

Where was he? Who was he with? What had he been doing right before he went to bed? Did he eat anything? Drink anything?

The last memory his exhausted mind held was of sitting in Sebastian's lap on the edge of the bed, holding his boyfriend in his arms.

That's right. He was with Sebastian…at Sebastian's house…in Sebastian's bed…and the man trying clumsily to take of his clothes had to be Sebastian, even if he smelled like brandy.

"Sebastian?" Kurt murmured, raising heavy arms to put his hands over his boyfriend's. "Sebastian? Are you a'right? Wha-what's going on?"

Sebastian sniffled in the dark, his hands stopping.

"I'm sorry," Sebastian said, his voice slurring slightly. "I didn't…I didn't mean to wake you…I just needed to feel you…"

"It's alright," Kurt said, taking hold of the hem Sebastian was struggling to lift. "Here, let me help you."

Kurt pulled off his shirt the rest of the way and shoved off his pants. The moment his clothes disappeared from his body, Sebastian wrapped Kurt up in his arms. He held Kurt and nothing more. He buried his face in the crook of Kurt's neck and sobbed softly.

In Sebastian's arms, regardless of the tears and the murmuring, regardless of the unusual tang of alcohol clinging to his breath, regardless of the things that would normally set Kurt's alarms off, Kurt drifted quickly to sleep.

Kurt had known monsters, and Sebastian was no monster.

Sebastian had a heart full of love. Kurt knew he would be safe.