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(BURNING) ONE HELL OF A SOMETHING;
CHAPTER 9
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(day 30)
For as long as he can remember, home had been a safe place. It never judged when he made a questionable decision, never doubted his sense of self, never even cared about who his soulmate would be. Home came ready-made as if he'd never been gone in the first place; coming home after long trips felt like coming back to a forever-place that he had missed, but never bore any mark of having missed him in return. That's what made it special. Like somehow a part of him had stayed behind and kept the bed warm, stored his scent, left everything neatly organized, the little things that made it his.
Yet, this time, it wasn't quite the same.
Everything stood where he'd left it; the pink and yellow post-its lining the mirror, reminders of things he needed to do before college; his box of tissues on the nightstand; his suitcases pulled down from the attic; his trophies. But the poster on the far wall, left of his bed... he wished someone would've had the common sense to take it down.
'THE WILD WEST' it read in a grand intimidating font, over a life-sized Jonathan, Sebastian's character.
He'd taken the poster down carefully, first the two thumbtacks at the bottom, then the two at the top with one hand keeping it in place, rolling it up into a tight cylinder before securing it with a rubber band. He tucked the poster away at the back of the top shelf of his wardrobe, where he hoped it would gather dust, be forgotten, until perhaps one day the future could be kinder to it.
He fails to fall into home the way he used to, the seams of his reentry visible to the naked eye; his room ever so slowly pouring into his suitcases, closets emptied, new supplies still in its wrapping or shopping bags; the near blanketing silences at the dinner table, his parents afraid to ask how he's feeling, how he's dealing, what exactly happened to cause such a sudden turn of events – he hadn't had the heart to tell them how Sebastian erased his name, tattooed something menial and demeaning over it without taking his feelings into account. All he feels and all he's felt over the past three weeks simply rattles through his head like an old rickety movie projector, a highlight reel of how his life turned upside down.
After all that happened, after all that didn't happen, all he could think to do was come home.
Now that he's home, he doesn't know what to do with himself.
"Charlie called while you were out," his mom says, drawing him out of thoughts he shouldn't focus on too hard lest he lose himself in them. He's been home a little over a week and Sebastian has been on his mind constantly – for some reason or other he can't seem to shake their final goodbye.
"Oh?" he asked absentmindedly, pushing carrots around on his near empty plate.
"Just checking in on you."
"I'll call her back later."
"Are you sure?" Charlie had asked once he shared his decision with her, too afraid to tell his brother first, too hurt to be treated with anything but understanding. Sebastian's lips haunted his with the whisper of their impression, the tickle of his breath over his forehead, the fragile shelter his body had offered for only a few minutes. He didn't (still doesn't) understand it himself, how Sebastian could pull closer yet push him away at the same time, how this want so clearly lived inside Sebastian too but he chose to ignore it. What for? Because he didn't believe in love? Because there were yet secrets between them? It was hard to imagine that was even possible.
"There's nothing here for me," he'd said, unable to meet Charlie's eyes, the no one wants me here choked back around a sense of duty and kindness he wouldn't let LA strip him of. Sebastian may not have wanted him there, but Coop and Charlie were family; and no matter what life threw at him, no matter what happened he knew that at the end of the day his family would always have his back. That's why he'd returned home in the first place.
"Son."
His dad this time, and he faces away in the hopes the word will remain stuck, that he doesn't have to cry the same tears he's cried, he's wanted to cry. But this is his mom and his dad, two people who have always been there for him, even when he didn't talk, even when he locked everything up inside and tried to deal with it on his own – he doesn't have to, he's never needed to, so why suffer in silence?
"He doesn't want me." His voice comes brittle and he shrinks smaller in his chair, his world caving in on itself once again – it was one thing to hear it from Sebastian, another to confess to the people who want nothing but the best for him, who have seen him hopeful with hearts in his eyes, who have heard him not only moon over Sebastian, The Hollywood Star, but his soulmate alike. It breaks his heart to think he might be breaking his parents'.
"Honey–"
"He tattooed something else over my name."
It bursts free nonetheless, pushes past lips that haven't forgotten Sebastian's, his hands trembling with the faint memory of his fingers entwined with his soulmate's, Sebastian's heart beating in the palm of his hand. How was that real? How could the universe, or Sebastian, grant him that perfect moment, and then take it away?
"He doesn't want it." His arms fold together across his chest in the hopes it'll hold him together, soothe some of the scrapes and bruises Hollywood left him with, and maybe help him get through this conversation without further harm done. "And he doesn't want me."
Without hesitation his parents get up out of their chairs and pull them up either side of him, his mother's hand in his hair while his dad's settles on his leg, and he tells them everything, spills all his secrets and Sebastian's in the safe space of home. He tells them about his first meeting with Sebastian, how things had seemed different right off bat, how he didn't have that magical moment people talk about when they meet their soulmate – instead they had a nice lunch together, they talked like two people interested in getting to know each other, and against all odds he'd found himself smitten with Sebastian there and then.
He tells them about Nick, and how tired that name now made him feel, about Sebastian's past love for a boy he hasn't even met, yet felt like a physical presence whenever they talked – he tells his parents how he suspects Sebastian hasn't gotten over his broken heart, despite Sebastian claiming otherwise, and that he'd stopped believing in the notion of soulmates. He cries that he doesn't understand how anyone can not believe, how Sebastian lived by his convictions and how crazy that drove him.
He tells them how they kissed, though leaves out the details, but how that kiss had transfigured into home, how Sebastian so very clearly felt something too, but ran scared in the face of it.
And he tells them about the day on the beach, when Sebastian spun his dreams into scraps lapping at the shore, stuck in the endless cycle of ebb and flow.
His secrets spill and a weight lifts off his shoulders, a weight he never had to carry on his own.
His mom kisses his hair and pulls him closer, but reserves her opinion, perhaps to share later with his dad, maybe later when his heart doesn't burn quite so hard and he could stand to hear it. He just needs them to be his mom and dad right now, nothing more, though certainly nothing less.
"He asked you to keep it quiet," his dad says, a sound in his voice both grave and angry, like any moment he could speed to Hollywood and tear Sebastian's house down with his bare hands.
He shakes his head, voice breaking, "Not Sebastian."
It's true the press had reported about him leaving for school, adding a statement from Sebastian saying he wouldn't stand in the way of Blaine's education – soulmates were still two individual people with lives of their own and he would never demand that Blaine stay in LA for him. He hadn't recognized Sebastian words. He heard Hunter's. Maybe even Santana's.
One day after his decision to come home, Hunter showed up on his doorstep. He hadn't started packing yet, but was staring at outgoing flights on his computer screen when Charlie led Hunter into his room.
"Mr Anderson," Hunter said, a clear and honest hesitation in the friendly smile that pulled around his mouth, informed by a careful tact he had no doubt prepared to use.
"What are you doing here?"
A few weeks ago he'd painted Hunter as a bad guy, as someone who had Sebastian's interests at heart and had no care for his, because he wasn't the client he tried to protect from scandal. He wondered if Hunter would leave him hurt too.
Hunter clutched a folder between both hands, lips set in a tight line as he drew in a breath, ready to break his heart all over again. "I'm here to remind you how important it is the press doesn't hear about this."
Shock didn't shake him quite as hard as he thought it would; maybe he was getting used to the way things were done in Hollywood. Hunter wanted him to keep quiet about what happened, wanted to avoid more headlines that painted Sebastian as the player who slept with whom he wanted, especially after the world so publicly met his soulmate. It wouldn't be the first time something like this ruined an actor's career.
"You came here as Sebastian's soulmate," Hunter added. "That's how the public perceives you now. You should leave his soulmate too."
He got up from his bed slowly; he'd barely recovered from his last night with Sebastian, from a goodbye in the form of a kiss, from the slow-release idea that he could choose his own happiness before anyone else's. But Hunter asked him to ignore the consequences of Sebastian's rejection, pretend they were still soulmates for the sake of public appearance and while he wished Sebastian no harm, nor his career any damage, how could he choose his happiness lying to the world? The world revolved around soulmates since the beginning of time. Did Sebastian's decision condemn him too?
"I can't pretend any of this didn't happen."
His feet begged him to run, out of that house, down to the beach, pick up all the grains of sand his life and Sebastian's touched and bottle them up, keep them safe from wind and rain and the corruption of Hollywood. Because he hung his hope on the secrecy Hunter demanded. Could it be that Sebastian simply needed time?
"Blaine–"
"It's fine." He closed his eyes, turning his back on Hunter. "I won't say anything."
Defeat filtered deeper than it had before, set stronger around his bones and nearly dragged him down to his knees. What if this meant giving up on love altogether? What if this decision sealed his fate with Sebastian and anyone else he might meet? Was falling in love with someone else even an option anymore?
"For what it's worth," Hunter said, "this isn't how I hoped it would play out. I really thought–"
"I was the genuine article?" he asked, using some of the first words Hunter spoke to him against him – he understood then why Hunter had been relieved to find him, after managing Sebastian's affairs with other boys, after trying to keep the press out of Sebastian's personal life for so long. Hunter hoped all the secrecy would end.
"You are. No doubt about that."
He turned to face Hunter. If he truly believed that, did that mean Hunter worked to convince Sebastian how wrong he was? Did that mean Santana didn't approve either? Santana had a soulmate she would marry soon, and, glancing down at the inside of Hunter's wrist, a name rested there too. He believed Hunter and Santana brought him here for appearance's sake, that all this was an elaborate stage play meant to appease a hungering crowd. Was he wrong? Did Santana and Hunter believe in him?
"I guess I underestimated Sebastian's stubbornness. If that's all it is."
Hunter's words, as well as his eyes, pleaded for an explanation, one he didn't have. He still wonders if stubbornness is all it is, if Sebastian's simply blind to what could be out there for him, or if it runs deeper, if there's yet another secret he hadn't managed to unravel. He suspects the latter. But it's hard to keep track.
"What did your parents say?" Tina asks, plopping down on her bed next to him, while he rifles through Netflix to find a show they hadn't binged yet. Despite the intermittent sensation that home wasn't quite the home he'd left he couldn't deny this is where he was meant to be; with his friends, who provided one distraction after the other; with his family, who never demanded what he couldn't give them; at the gym, where he could work himself into a sweat and beat at a punching bag until the only thing he felt were his knuckles taped up firmly inside his boxing gloves.
Home might feel strange for a while. But he needed it.
"Nothing much." He shrugs. "I didn't really want them to say anything."
"What do you mean?"
He sits up on the bed, Tina tucking in close. "Ever since my birthday everyone keeps saying the same thing. Everything will fall into place. Things will get better. Be patient."
"You can't give up hope, Blaine."
He finds Tina's eyes, and smiles, but knows deep down he's holding too much hope for the future; Sebastian wanted him to break free, maybe even give up, but all he can think about is the possibility of Sebastian changing his mind. Even though a part of him considers the worst-case scenario: maybe Sebastian had meant every word, maybe he'd been conscious of every single one of his actions.
Maybe Sebastian would never come find him again, despite all the times he had in LA.
He can't count all the times they said goodbye; at the beach, at Sebastian's house after that wonderful kiss, at Cooper and Charlie's place. The day he left for home Sebastian had showed up again, quite unexpectedly; he hadn't counted on seeing him again so soon, prepared to let his broken heart gather dust too until the future chose to catch up.
He'd been on the phone with Tina, making sure she knew when he'd land and when his parents would leave for Columbus to pick him up. He can't remember what they'd been talking about when he said, "Sebastian's more likely to have his own name tattooed on his arm", and a voice sounded from the doorway.
"Ouch."
Sebastian's voice.
He whirled around and nearly dropped his phone, but still managed a quick, "Tay, I have to go," before he lost his focus and his best friend's voice died out. What was Sebastian doing there? Had someone told him when he'd be flying out? What else was there left to say?
"I'm sorry," he says, as if the words themselves could negate all the causal effects between all the things they'd ever said to each other. What he wouldn't give to start over with all the knowledge he possessed; he would've approached Sebastian a different way, he'd have been more wary, less naïve, overall less taken with all the potential for wonderment surrounding him. Then again, would it have been worth it if that different way hadn't been authentic?
"Don't be," –an almost painful smile pulled at Sebastian's lips,– "I deserved that."
"What are you doing there?" he asked, because he thought they'd said everything that needed to be said, they'd said their goodbyes, with a kiss, with a hug, with no words other than there's no hope for us. Sebastian didn't have the answers he was looking for. And he grew tired of digging without result. "Hunter already told me not to talk to the press."
"I didn't ask him to do that." Sebastian sighed. "You have every right to–"
It should've been nice to know that despite everything Sebastian cared, that he realized he'd wronged him in the worst possible way, but the thought didn't help keep the pain at bay. Because Sebastian said what he needed to say, yet he came back, for a second time now, and for what? To see him off? To make sure he'd made the right choice? Why did Sebastian keep demanding this pain?
"Sebastian," –a thought occurred then, one that had gently brewed in the recesses of a mind rife with love and dreams and fantasy– "Are you happy?"
"Happy?" Sebastian frowned, the word strange, foreign, like he once similarly couldn't decipher his brother's Great Soulmate Mystery. It wasn't a difficult question, but an enormously big one, one not usually answered with a few concise words. Let alone in the space between them. Happiness wasn't something people considered until it disappeared, flitted from your life like snow gave way to the sun. He wondered if for all his personal choices after his break-up with Nick, Sebastian still took regular stock of his life.
"With your life here."
Sebastian rolled a single shoulder, as if to shrug an invisible jacket into place, shake off a sudden discomfort his question made him face, a great and terrible thing. "Why would you ask me that?"
His body completed the half-turn it started half a minute before, Sebastian's vulnerabilities curiosities he never took for granted, but drew him closer like magnets, even though they weren't entirely the opposites of his; it's quite possible it's their similarities in dealing with personal feelings that kept him picking at those wounds. "You don't seem very happy."
Sebastian struggled, that much he'd ascertained. Whether that struggle stemmed from the weight of his secrets, his own pursuit of happiness, or his own broken heart, he could only guess at.
"I don't see–" Sebastian cast down his eyes, shuffled a step back as he slipped his hands into his pockets, doing everything in his power to escape invisible chains. He wanted to pull closer, undo those shackles with his bare hands, but he lacked the power to do so. It was a power Sebastian's only.
"You should've seen him, Tina," he says, facing his best friend, the memory so clear in his mind he can still feel his feet planted on the cool floorboards, his breath in and out of his lungs like hot smoke, heart hammering. "It's like I threw him in the deep end of the pool and he forgot how to swim. He wasn't Sebastian anymore."
And yet he's come to believe it's exactly that Sebastian, that boy, he should get to know, who he caught glimpses of in those sparse conversations they shared, whose feelings were real, the Sebastian who kissed him back and tasted like home. The only difference being Sebastian's lips had been missing and searching for his all along.
"And then Coop kicked him out." He turns on his back, unable to stifle a smile, the way Cooper had taken charge a sight unseen for many years. In so many ways he never did give him enough credit, his big brother.
Sebastian had left without another word, just cast a single glance at him, green eyes almost fearful, before walking out of his life completely. It's the last he'd seen from Sebastian. It's the last he'd heard. For almost a week now. He can't pretend he hasn't spent a few hours every day thinking about Sebastian, trying to imagine what he could be doing, who he could be with, if he was vigorously preparing for shooting that romantic comedy he'd told him about over their first meal together. He wonders if Sebastian's memories of him will gather dust too and will soon be forgotten, or if they'll remain etched deep in his skin the way his will. A few times over the past week he'd lain awake at night, terrified that of the two of them, Sebastian had already moved on.
His last night in LA he hadn't slept at all. He'd drenched the pillow with his tears, held back tears as he'd bid his brother, Charlie and his unborn niece or nephew goodbye, and spent a tumultuous flight in and out of dreamless sleep.
"You don't think he's happy?" Tina asks, somehow timing all her questions just so to pull him back from the darkest kinds of thoughts. He would have already gotten lost in them, if it weren't for his friends.
"I think he thinks he's happy."
It's easy to forego happiness, to accept it as a default status and not question it, even when you feel it slipping away. Happiness is often a thing taken for granted, so he wonders: was Sebastian happy in LA when he clearly missed Broadway? Did he accept his choices as his own and stand by them? Had he not decided he didn't deserve love prematurely? For someone professing clear-cut choices for his mental health, Sebastian still had a lot of things to figure out.
"Are you happy, Bling?"
"I don't know." He blinks a few times, taking stock of his own battle scars. There's no doubt he made the right decision coming home. He hasn't breathed this easy for a while now and he's missed everything about home; the quiet and calm rhythm, his steady routine, the silences only small towns afforded. But is he happy?
"Sometimes I feel like I'm not supposed to be."
He remembers a conversation he had with his brother not too long ago, a conversation mirrored in one he had with Marley at the mall a few days ago; she worried that he'd be upset with her because she didn't choose her soulmate, that he'd think she chose wrong, especially because Ryder actually wanted to be with her. Truth is he fell silent around her because he worried about saying the wrong thing, he worried that his lack of understanding would be misconstrued, because he couldn't wrap his mind around it. Marley chose Jake over her soulmate.
Then he remembered he's never been in love before.
So he'd kept quiet.
"I followed my heart," Marley had said, barely able to look him in the eye over her pink milkshake.
"How do you know what it's saying?"
An easy question.
But an enormously big one.
"Jake's there for me when I need him," Marley said, her beautiful eyes wide and shining along with the rest of her features; it was the face of a girl head over heels in love. And he envied her. "He makes me laugh, I can tell him everything, he's confident, and he makes me more confident. That's the kind of person I need to be with."
Both Cooper and Marley had ended up saying the same thing, which only confused him more. Charlie and Cooper were soulmates, Marley and Jake were not, yet they needed their significant other for the same reasons. Cooper made Charlie softer, coaxed out a lot of the love and affection she usually kept hidden; in turn, Charlie believed in Cooper in ways his brother often didn't believe in himself. They complemented each other.
But he can't for the life of him figure out what he needs. Someone to believe in him, definitely, someone who believes in love, absolutely, someone who wouldn't stifle his dreams or ask him to sacrifice. Someone to look past his flaws.
It's truly frightening how few of those apply to Sebastian. Or how many.
Mostly he was just scared.
"He gave up my name, Tee," he says, lying down on his side to face his best friend.
"That was four years ago." Tina softly strokes the inside of his left wrist where it rests between their heads. It seems so long ago that they were eagerly awaiting the arrival of his soulmark, two kids in love with the idea of love. "Maybe he needs to get used to idea there's someone out there for him."
Sebastian should have known that all along, he thinks, but he's too quickly reminded Hollywood is a world of its own, with its own rules and views on soulmarks. If he'd grown up in that world, who knows how he might feel about soulmates.
"I'm excited to head to college," he says, ready to change the topic of their conversation.
"We're going to have so much fun." Tina snuggles closer into his arms. "You won't have time to think about anything else."
He buries a smile in Tina's hair, confident that no matter what the future brings he'll have her by his side. He'll have his parents, and his brother, and he'll make new friends who might change his perspective. He'll be learning new things at his college of choice and his memories of Sebastian will gather dust, they'll be shelved until a time they're no longer painful to the touch.
He has to choose his own happiness, after all. Even his brother ended up telling him that.
"Hey, kiddo." Cooper had wandered into his room while he finished packing. "You all set?"
"Getting there."
"You know you're free to stay." Cooper lingered in the doorway, tapping his fingers rhythmically against the frame. "Or visit, whenever you want. It's been nice, having you here."
Of all the things he'd been forced to face about himself and his beliefs, his relationship with his brother hadn't been strained. When he came there he thought it'd be a test, living cooped up with a brother who he'd always had a difficult relationship with. He was happy to have been proven wrong. He'd witnessed new sides of his brother, some of the insecurities they're both so adept at hiding, and his life here with Charlie. His brother was happy.
"Thanks, Coop," he said, toying with the thought that his brother was home too, in a way. But he missed his sweaters and his room, his mom's hot chocolate and the Lima Bean. He missed his friends or anything more familiar. "I just have to be home for a while."
Cooper nodded, taking a few steps back. "I understand."
"Coop– for what it's worth," he called, and hoped to still catch his brother in the same mood. There was something he'd been meaning to say since he got there but never go the chance to. Now that he was leaving, he wanted to share it. "I think you're going to be a great dad."
"Yeah?"
He drew closer to Cooper, unaccustomed still to see his brother doubt himself. "Of course you are."
"Because, I gotta tell you–" Cooper crossed his arms over his chest, tears making up the uncertainty in his eyes. "I'm terrified I'm going to mess up. I'm not like you, or dad. I've never had to be responsible for someone else. I make a living doing commercials, for God's sake."
He cupped one of Cooper's elbows. "You make a living doing what you love, Coop," he said, his heart not unscathed by his brother's confession – he couldn't say why talking to his brother was easier now, but he was beyond grateful for it. "That's worth more than any job. It's inspiring."
Cooper caught his eyes, a big question reflected in blue eyes, nothing like his.
"You know mom and dad don't really want me to be a teacher," he said, "but it's what I want. And I'm doing it because of you. Because my big brother followed his dreams too."
Before the words even had time to sink in Cooper pulled him closer, wound his arms around him and hugged him as close as he possibly could. "I'm gonna miss you, squirt," Cooper breathed, running a hand up and down his back.
He closed his eyes and laughed, "Please, stop calling me that," but basked in the odd unfamiliarity of hugging his own brother. It probably wouldn't kill him to visit more often.
"Coop–" he said, still wrapped up tight in his brother's arms. "Do you think I'm doing the right thing?"
Cooper slapped his back. "Gotta do you, little brother."
He laughed. Cooper always did have a way of simplifying the obvious.
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tbc
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