as i mentioned in the last two chapters, this is actually a triple update. there are three chapters that i just recently uploaded. for those of you that are like me and just skip the latest chapter... go read from Chapter 35 since from then on it's new.
this is one of the more intense chapters, so i'm hoping to keep you a little bit on your toes! i might actually update before the New Years' too... we'll see!
Eat Your Words
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Kurt just had to take a piss the second that he walked into Sebastian Smythe's old infested shack of doom and gloom. There was just something about having to see the world's biggest collection of moths that just made Kurt's bladder want to contract! However, he'd rather piss in his new jeans than ask Sebastian was the bathroom was.
But he could technically ask the termites behind the wall. They were probably fond of the plumbing in this house!
Dave looked nauseated. Kurt was sure he'd much rather sleep in a ditch with a corpse than live here.
"This is a fucking swamp!" Dave's voice raised three octaves. He sounded more like Kurt now. "My shits look nicer."
Kurt did not know the contents of Dave's bowels, but Kurt was sure that there were mammoths taking nicer shits.
Nate was silent-faced and disgusted. He let out a girlish scream when he saw a moth flying to him. "HELP!"
He jumped up and then tried to duck against the flying contraception of tropical illnesses. Sebastian was completely unfazed because it was lame to be scared of anything other than the idea of eating Pop-Tarts for breakfast.
"Barnes, if you're going to cry for help, every time you see something that ain't pretty, then we're going to be here all fucking day," Sebastian hissed coldly, his shoulders slumping. He practically disappeared every time he took an inhale. Every time Sebastian went to sleep in the house, Kurt considered the need to give him the kiss of life. The thought of Sebastian and Kurt locking lips would probably be enough to prevent Sebastian from dying in his sleep. "Keep your eyes on Lady Hummel. He's finally more pleasant-looking than something."
Yes, Kurt would like to think that he looked better-looking than a mutant moth the size of a hockey puck.
"Sebastian, that is not funny," Kurt said softly. Sebastian was way more disturbed when Kurt told him that he had to wake up before noon for his own appointment. He acted like he was being tortured—which… he had been.
"Dave thinks it's funny," Sebastian put Dave on the spot, who forced a torturous chuckle. "See?"
"Dave does not think it's funny," Kurt crossed his arms over his chest. "For Prada's sake, this house eludes ghosts!"
"No, I don't have any lube," Sebastian replied, smirking. This time, Dave was sort of smiling.
Nate danced around bugs like he was the one that had to pee—which didn't help Kurt's situation. Meanwhile, Sebastian assessed the living room like he could see beyond the cum-covered couch and vomit-strewn carpet. A house that could truly make Finn's treehouse looked like it belonged on the front cover of a home improvement magazine!
There were pictures of Sebastian as a kid all over the floor. The picture frames were shattered.
Kurt had a difficult time making out the round-shaped six-year-old to be anything like the emaciated Sebastian that he knew now. And was that pink that Sebastian was wearing? Kurt was so convinced that Sebastian was so allergic to pink he couldn't even eat strawberries in case he grew a big, fat vagina overnight. He was smiling brightly with a mouthful of metal. Kurt assumed this was before Sebastian knew what a blowjob even meant.
Seeing a family of maggots near the pots, Kurt's breathing hitched. He might die from a urinary tract infection.
This house was a living nightmare! From the sour-smelling carpets that Sebastian affectionately dubbed as the mould museum to shattered, blood-covered stairs that probably had more of Sebastian's blood than he himself did! How unnerving was it that you were walking on something stained with someone else's blood?
No wonder Sebastian looked like he fed vampires every night. His blood painted the walls.
"Sebastian?" Dave called after him softly, like just being in here long enough would break Sebastian in two halves.
He ignored Dave and just hobbled upstairs with his crutches. Of course, he didn't react to the squeaking steps or the fact that there were more exotic insects in this household than in forests around the world. There were fossils in the couch that could pre-date dinosaurs. The walls smelled like a chemical factory just exploded. The wallpapers were peeling off. But Kurt could not for the life of him figure out where that smell was coming from! The smell of a rat that died from the shits? The pungent scent of measles? The fragrant smell of Voldemort's decaying body?
Nate looked at Sebastian dumbly, like he just finally saw Sebastian for what he was. His soft blue eyes were bubbling over with tears. "Hey," he reached over to touch Sebastian's bony shoulder. "Are you okay?"
"I'm ready to piss myself with excitement," Sebastian replied icily, which made Kurt nearly piss himself.
Kurt bet Sebastian was remembering the days that he was there where nobody helped him out. There were people in the world that let him live here. How bad was that? That there were people that didn't mind that a sixteen-year-old emaciated kid came home to the night of living terrors? And Kurt was one of them!
"Sebastian, is this really that important?" Dave, who was happy to drive him here, asked. "This place is—"
"Hey, buddy, I used to live here. If I remember correctly, I asked you if I could stay the fucking night in your house and you told me that I should count my blessings that you accepted my fucking flowers," Sebastian told Dave, trying to pretend like the crutches weren't bothering him since his endurance was strictly related to how many episodes of Suits he could wash before he crashed. "So, can it or get out. I ain't here to wipe off anyone's tears."
Nate rubbed the tears out of his eyes. "Oh…okay," he stammered, looking embarrassed that he was crying.
Dave looked surprised. Kurt was too, since pretty much everything that Dave did nowadays was ethereal and magical.
"I didn't know that…" Dave's voice was low. "If I knew that this is where you lived—"
Sebastian cocked his head to one side, looking back at Dave. They were at the top part of the collapsible-looking stairs.
"Should I have told you the bed bugs bite me when I sleep?" Sebastian asked. "Would you have BELIEVED me?"
Dave looked taken back, but he nodded his head. "I'm sorry, Sebastian." He paused. "If you showed pictures…?"
Sebastian was fuming. "So, pics, or my father punching me to death DIDN'T HAPPEN?" his tone got even colder, and Kurt shuddered like he'd been slapped with a block of ice. "Oh, I get it, Dave! It's MY FAULT! If I just let the world know that my fucking father regrets not suffocating me when I was a fucking baby, I bet that I'D feel a lot better!"
Dave flinched, but Kurt could understand Sebastian's hostility. He shouldn't have to show someone that he was being physically abused by his father to get help. It was like asking a rape victim for proof. What asshole would do that?
Sebastian shook his head in disbelief. "Believe it or not, Karofsky, I'd rather not tell the whole fucking world the most intimate details of my fucking life just so they guy I like could let me stay in his house for a few days!"
Dave was rendered speechless. He opened his mouth to say something but whatever he had to say died on his lips.
"I'M… NOT… THAT… DEPSERATE!" Sebastian yelled back, his crutches shaking under his wrath.
Sebastian didn't look very forgiving, standing there in the hallway where he nearly shot himself to death. It was still covered with his blood, dried on the carpets and the walls. It looked like a scene out of a horror movie.
"YOU wanted PICTURES, right?" Sebastian asked Dave seriously. "THIS is where I nearly fucking bled to death! But maybe—if you don't believe that then—" Sebastian leaned against the wall and pulled up his shirt.
Underneath the black cloth, Sebastian pointed towards patches of big-blue bruises that still hadn't healed from months ago. "This is where he stepped on my chest with his fucking boot," he pointed towards a bleeding gash from a belt-shaped wound. "I got matching ones on my back. Do you wanna see? What about you, Hummel? You like matching crap all the fucking time. Do you wanna see? Do you fucking believe me? Or do you want to see where he set me on fucking fire? Do you want my fucking medical records? My fucking X-rays?"
Sebastian let his shirt drop down. Every time Kurt saw him shirtless, he felt like Sebastian lost ten more pounds.
Dave looked like he'd been slapped. Yeah, slapped by the wasted guy that was tired of walking around in crutches.
Kurt felt a shudder down his spine, remembering the pale, bleeding Sebastian lying on the ground. Remembering the gun that he was holding, and how wide-eyed he was. Kurt had never noticed how green Sebastian's eyes were, or how young he was. Or how relieved he was when he felt Sebastian's heart pounding against his thin chest. And how he was so very thin that Kurt could see his heart pulsating against his prominent ribs in his tight shirt.
There was a trail of papers on the side of the hallway that Kurt didn't notice before, covered in blood. They were all decorated with bullet holes. Kurt had seen enough bad horror movies with Blaine to know what was coming next.
"Sebastian, I don't think that this is safe if we…" Kurt felt queasy. Because bullet holes of pieces of paper were generally a sign to bolt from a house as fast as possible. "You could get hurt."
"I could get hurt?" Sebastian mocked, gesturing to his crutches. "What could possibly make this fucking worse?"
No matter how much Kurt thought about it, he couldn't fathom the idea that Sebastian lived here. It was probably like trying to teach Finn geometry. Because who could live here?
Sebastian probably inhaled enough asbestos here for a lifetime.
Sebastian pulled himself up with his crutches and practically hobbled his way right to another room. Dave sprinted to him, because Sebastian looked tired. Kurt would be too, if he was trying to walk around America's Scariest Haunted House with enough oxycodone in his system to kill a drug addict. Which, of course, the doctor prescribed to Sebastian because he probably had fractured every single part of his body at one point or another.
In fact, last time Kurt drove Sebastian to the surgeon, the doctor took pictures of his X-rays. And then he called in other doctors to look at them. When Sebastian said he did three sports, they all looked at him like he was insane.
Now, the most vigorous sport Sebastian could do was taking a shower. And he shouldn't even do that alone.
"We should back off," Nate told Kurt softly. "If I lived here and nobody did anything about it, I'd be pissed too. Hell, I'd probably be pissed forever. And I sure as hell wouldn't trust anyone."
Kurt nodded his head in agreement. "Are you taking pictures?" he just noticed Nate had his iPhone's camera out.
Nate nodded his head. "Yeah," he said. "I know that he said that stuff about not needing pictures, but just in case he wished he had taken some… you know? But it's not like I'm going to use them. But maybe… maybe he just wants to show people the truth, you know? And he should. People should know that this happened right under their noses—especially the teachers. He needs to let it out, so he could try to move on, you get me?"
Kurt felt bad, thinking about everything. He didn't feel like the nice minority that he did all this time in high school.
"Dalton has a new principal now," Nate said. "After how public it got, they had to do something. My mom didn't even want to send me there anymore—but this new one is nicer. She asked if she could visit him."
Kurt didn't know why he found the news shocking. Sebastian's dad was so high-profile that he bet that Dalton had to do a massive overhaul for managing not to notice that that Sebastian's BMI was lower than a stoner's grades.
He remembered opening a magazine and shuddered at the pictures they chose to use. But he looked worse in real life.
"Are people talking about him in Dalton?" Kurt cautiously asked. Nate nodded his head.
"All the time! Even the teachers!" Nate didn't look happy about it. Even more so when a giant tarantula climbed on top of Nate's shiny black loafers, but he shook it off without a problem. Out of all the stuff that was here, big harmless hairy spiders weren't really that bad. "Some people think that it's really sad, some people think that he's lying about it… the calculus teacher is so embarrassed because he even saw Sebastian for a little bit during the summer."
Mr Wright was now Mr Wrong. "Oh," Kurt said. "Him failing a class that he said that he didn't take?"
"Yeah," Nate shook his head. "It's a big fucking mess, and Dalton had to do something about it. But I think that if Sebastian goes back to Dalton, he's going to have a lot of people that are gonna help him. They changed a lot, so you know, they could assure parents that this isn't gonna happen again."
Hearing this, Kurt felt like the best thing for Sebastian was not to take the year off but to go back to Dalton. It sounded like a lot of people wanted to help him out, and Sebastian needed human contact.
By the time they got to Sebastian's room, Sebastian was sitting on a broken-looking bed with a giant rat in his hand and a box of stuff beside him. The bed stunk of chlorine and body odour. There was a shattered lamp that was in the house's favourite shade—beige and red-brown congealed old blood that could make period blood look sexy (unfortunately, he stumbled across Rachel's tampons in her bedroom before.). There were papers flying everywhere. There was a small, fat disgusting giant rat on the side of the room that had blood pouring of it faster than water from a tap or… Kurt looked down at his crotch with a red hue to his cheeks. He did not need to think about that now. Control yourself, Kurt! He tried to tell himself. Pregnant woman do it all the time!
Sebastian relaxed when Dave dug out a well-maintained manila folder from the pile of tattered clothes. Sebastian put the big, fat rat in the box, and immediately tore the file from Dave's hands.
"Thanks, big guy," Sebastian said, his hands protectively around that file that was important enough to die for.
"Is that a rat?" Kurt said in disgust, seeing that thing stare back at him. "You are not bringing THAT into my house!"
Sebastian stared at the rat. "He's my fucking pet. I'm taking him," he finally said. "Suck it up, princess."
Kurt was staring at the contents of the box. He didn't know why Sebastian had a stuffed toy giraffe in there for, or a sweater that looked about as outdated as Mr Schue's song selections. Fortunately, the rest of the stuff was important: the keys to his beaten-down car, his French passport, and details of his reports from his old schools. Kurt was sad to see about a dozen pictures of that cocky asshole when he was at a weight that wasn't playing with death every day.
"Fine," Kurt gave up. "But I'm taking you shopping after this… with Mercedes!"
"So, you want to buy me stuff for free?" Sebastian cocked his head to one side. "I'll think about it."
When one of the harmless tarantulas walked into the room, Nate leisurely picked it up. Kurt rolled his eyes.
Of course, Nate was the kind of guy that probably had snakes as pets. Just to show off how manly he was, and how his biceps could totally get him into a new Marvel movie if he just auditioned. Kurt heard a wheeze and looked down to see Sebastian's face. He was whiter than a marshmallow covered in white chocolate.
Sebastian practically stopped breathing. He could somehow not bat an eye when a soul-sucking moth whizzed in front of him, but the harmless spider had him looking like he was about to have a heart attack.
"You're scared of spiders?" Dave asked, looking surprised. A white-faced Sebastian slowly nodded his head.
"Let's go," Sebastian said almost immediately. Kurt couldn't believe he was about to have a panic attack.
Sebastian didn't mind walking through the hallway where he nearly died, but a spider was enough to paralyse him.
Fortunately, everyone felt much better when they left the house. Sebastian regained his vigor in about three seconds. Especially when Kurt drove like… well, Sebastian… to the nearest possible toilet, of course. In the middle of taking the longest and most gratifying piss in his whole life, Sebastian walked in the bathroom—not because he needed to use it—but just to make fun of him for looking like a guy that just came after taking off his constraining cock ring.
Then Sebastian asked him if he had any kind of moisturising regimen for his 'chick dick.' Which put Kurt in a mood.
In fact, Sebastian's mood hadn't completely tanked after that visit to The House of What Happens Beyond the Grave.
Meanwhile, Kurt, Nate and Dave just wanted to rethink what happened in the last few months—seriously. Kurt bet that there were cleaner decade-old skeletons six feet under than that house. He bet that even most bacteria ran in the other direction when it came to that coven of Candida. And Sebastian lived there for ages by himself. Sure, Kurt had been there before, and he had found it disgusting. But now, that he wasn't thinking about the threat to Sebastian's life, he was shocked by how he'd managed to walk upstairs without fainting the first time!
After dropping Nate and Dave back to their cars, Kurt drove to Mercedes' house. Sebastian was relatively quiet, playing with his contaminated rat. Kurt tried to ignore the fact that they might die of the plaque tomorrow.
Mercedes was dressed also in all black. It made Kurt feel off in his mostly-white ensemble.
"What are you wearing black for?" Mercedes asked Sebastian. "I could literally kill you by sitting on you."
"Yeah, try to sit on a guy with a broken fucking leg," Sebastian mumbled in irritation. "See what happens."
Mercedes didn't threaten to sit on him to shut him up—though Kurt wanted to. "Where do you like to shop at?"
"I only shop at thrift stores," Sebastian snorted, crossing his arms. "I don't even like shopping… and I'm broke."
"Too bad," Kurt said. "Because you're going to buy something that isn't going to fall apart by the second use."
Sebastian just gestured towards his threadbare-looking clothes, as if they were completely fine. They might be fine—if you were auditioning for Oliver Twist. Kurt had honestly seen Sebastian drink more expensive water.
"What's going on with you and Dave Karofsky?" Mercedes asked Sebastian, who didn't expect the question.
"He's dating a living marshmallow," Sebastian said, and Kurt shuddered. He didn't understand how Sebastian could not only be a minority, but a former fat kid that probably got picked on a few times for being overweight and still act like he couldn't even fathom the idea of having a little extra stuffing. "How do you think I feel?"
Extra stuffing to him is probably having one of his ribs disappear after a giant meal of half a sandwich, Kurt mused to himself.
"What about Blaine?" Mercedes asked. Kurt cleared his throat—Blaine's boyfriend was right there you know!
Sebastian just shook his head. "Didn't work out," he explained. "Thought that the princess understood what I was all about, you know? He's a really nice guy, but he doesn't get where I'm coming from. But with… you know, after Dave tried to—… yeah, it just…I thought that he might get me. Since we're both technically evil jocks that got mentally fucked so… yeah. But I don't think it's gonna work out either. Cause he don't like me like that."
Kurt did not expect Sebastian to pour his heart out to Mercedes like that. "What makes you think that?"
He couldn't believe he was having a conversation with Sebastian and he didn't once mention the fact that all that white made him look like a giant just came all over him. It was… progress.
Sebastian looked like he was thinking about it. "He said he's into me, and then he gets together with Trent in the same fucking week," he snorted. He looked a little sad—like the kind of sad when you realised that you were chasing a guy that didn't even know you existed. "Come on. A guy that's into me wouldn't do that."
"That's a low blow," Mercedes replied, running her hand through her perfectly blow-dried hair. "No bar dates?"
"Nope," Sebastian popped his p. He was half-texting something that looked like the next script to the Game of Thrones book. He was telling Burt about what he wanted changed in the basement. "Did you ever sleep with a guy?"
"No," Mercedes said. Sebastian looked impressed. Not many virgins could give off the vibe that they weren't pathetic.
Sebastian was also amused. "You need a knight to ride on a horse and prove to you that he's worth penetrating you?"
"What's that supposed to mean?" Mercedes shot back almost immediately.
"Sebastian," Kurt sighed out in exasperation, letting his hands relax on the wheel. If they die tonight, it was Sebastian's fault for not being able to handle the fact that some people stayed virgins past thirteen. "Please, behave."
"Spank me and I'll consider it," Sebastian said, but then started laughing. "Can you even spank anyone? I bet you got the hands of a fucking baby. I'm sure that if you try to spank me, I might actually get bored and fall asleep."
"And you were so nice just a second ago," Kurt mentioned. "I'm not the one that looks like they're getting their balls twisted every time they try to kid themselves into thinking they actually want to drink another soy cappuccino."
"Ha," Sebastian rolled his eyes. "I actually had that happen before. If it happens, you won't be drinking nothing."
Kurt was sure Finn said that he had his balls twisted before. But Finn did say that he was pretty sure that he knew the pain of childbirth now. He was also sure that his balls didn't even work the same way anymore, which was more information than Kurt ever needed to know about his stepbrother's testicles.
Yeah, the stepbrother that Kurt used to creepily stalk for three years of his life? That one.
At the mall, Kurt and Mercedes managed to walk out of three stores with enough shopping to last most people for a year. Meanwhile, Sebastian decided to stay outside and drink a giant peach smoothie.
"You have to buy something," Kurt finally said to Sebastian. "I didn't go to this shopping trip for myself."
Sebastian was gawking at the Kurt's bags. "Yeah? For me?" he asked incredulously. "Look, Hummel, I don't want your help. I already got clothes that I'm trying to fit back into," Sebastian looked very uncomfortable. He sounded like Mercedes doubting whether or not she should stay a virgin until marriage or let loose and hook up with Sam Evans.
"Okay," Kurt was convinced. He just realised that he was starving! He… hadn't eaten since breakfast—and Sebastian slept through breakfast. "Sebastian… uh… are you hungry?" He nodded off to the smoothie.
Sebastian nodded his head. "Yeah," he paused. "I'm hungry."
Kurt felt like a dick. How could he forgot to feed the one guy that actually needed to eat all the time? He didn't think Sebastian would say that he was hungry. "We can eat and go, okay?" Sebastian nodded his head. Kurt was sure that he messed up by asking Sebastian to shop with him, but he really didn't know why.