this is a double update. i've been writing a lot during the break it seems. but i go back to hospital tomorrow. fortunately, i still am a few chapters ahead.
Eat Your Words
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Blaine was supposed to meet up with Kurt, Mercedes and Sebastian for lunch at Breadstix. But Sebastian looked close to a mental breakdown when they fried his fish instead of grilling it, so they came back to Kurt's house.
Now, they were ordering a pizza and Sebastian was eating one he made at home with whole-wheat crust.
When Blaine dug into his slice of pepperoni, he tried to ignore the fact that he noticed that there were little burn marks on the side of his neck too, and a tiny little black T tattooed next to his right ear. He didn't say anything about it.
When Blaine dug into his slice of pepperoni, he remembered the messages that Kurt sent him about Sebastian's house.
I'd rather sleep with a ninety-year-old grandma than live that house, Kurt… passionately sent. That's WITHOUT lube!
Blaine remembered Kurt complaining about having to keep the house overflowing with more vegetables than a garden, just so that Sebastian would have something to eat whenever he wanted it. They had five bags of pasta, all of them containing wild variations of wheat for the wheat-intolerant Sebastian. He refused to eat anything white other than dick juice—which was apparently nutritious according to an article Blaine read before. They had enough superfoods stocked in the house to get them through a nuclear explosion. Every day, Carole bought more and more. Now, they probably had enough protein bars to feed every steroid user in America.
Sebastian leaned his head back against Blaine's legs when they were watching TV. He looked comfortable.
There were enough flowers in this house to make McKinley's homecoming dance look boring. Sebastian had probably been seriously spoiled over the last few weeks since he came back from the hospital, and he really deserved it.
Blaine thought back to all the unnecessary drama that happened in the last few months. He really wanted to somehow make it up to Sebastian. He felt bad about being such a lousy friend. Okay. Sebastian wasn't exactly the best friend that he ever wanted to have—just as Blaine was crappy to Sebastian for a while, Sebastian was pretty crappy back to him. He invaded his personal space pretty much every day, and he nearly blinded him that one time out of jealousy.
An eye for an eye, Sebastian? Blaine remembered sending him as a text pretty much a day after it happened. Seriously?
Thinking back to the whole 'is Sebastian really homeless' debate, Blaine felt bad. Because he didn't know he was homeless, but he knew spent a night sleeping his car—which might as well just be a cardboard box with wheels. Looking back now, it was SO obvious! Like how-did-I-miss-that-that-slushie-hit-harder-than-I-thought obvious. In one of those photos, Sebastian was sleeping on a mangled sweater, shirtless in an overheated car in the beginning of summer!
Sure, he couldn't ask his parents if Sebastian could stay in the house now, because they knew that he blinded him.
Blaine also knew that the first thing Sebastian would do when he walked into his house was ask his mom why she bothered with a bra and that even him, with a weight lower than Kurt's polls for class president, had a bigger chest.
Also, why else would he be wearing those oversized rags? Blaine had more fashionable curtains at home.
With the chagrin of a fish being eaten by a blood-thirsty cat or an unsuspecting Will Schuester being hit on by an enthusiastic Rachel Berry, Blaine sighed deeply at his slice. He wasn't even hungry anymore. He had more nerves than he did in his exam days. And the hot chocolate that Kurt made was still too hot to drink.
"Sebastian?" Blaine leaned down to see his face. "Are we cool?" he asked softly.
Depends, Sebastian's voice said in his head. Are you cool enough to give me a blowjob?
Sebastian looked up at him. He looked confused and exhausted. "I guess," now, that was as convincing as compliment from Sue Sylvester. "It's been a long day, Blaine. Can we just not talk about it?" that was a whole two sentences that… sounded normal. And he called Blaine by his name, and not Prince of That's Why They Invented Masturbation.
"Hey, what happened?" Blaine had been the recipient of many four-am booty calls from a very drunk, weary Sebastian Smythe. He knew when he was in a real mood.
"A bad shopping trip," Kurt admitted, rolling his eyes. "I'm not sure what I did to offend you—"
"You didn't offend me, Princess Peach. That's not what happened," Sebastian snorted, trying to cut his pizza slices apart with his spoon. This was not a normal thing that people did when eating pizza. People also did not put alfalfa sprouts on their pizzas. "So, drop it. Not everything is about you and your delicate snowflake sensibilities."
Kurt placed his plate down, looking at Sebastian solemnly. "No, I won't," he said. "Because you were fine before!"
"Yeah, I know," Sebastian snorted. "But tell me, Oh Leader of the Glitter Revolution, what's the point of me getting some nice clothes at this fucking weight if I'm just supposed to put some weight on? Unless I can… well… you know!"
"Unless you can stay looking like a ghost?" Kurt asked. "That's… that's the most illogical thing I've ever heard!"
Kurt looked at him in disbelief. "Sebastian, your clothes are falling apart. That is the ONLY reason I want you to shop with us. But you… you just manage to contort something as innocent as me caring for your wellbeing into-into—!"
"HA! You think that I developed a fucking eating disorder out of LOGIC, Hummel?" Sebastian asked Kurt seriously, staring at him with hard sea-green eyes. "I'm that guy that wishes that he can get gastric fucking bypass because he's terrified of losing himself in folds of fucking fat! You think that I think like you do? Do you know that when I was a kid, I was so fat I didn't even know where to stab myself with my own fucking insulin pen?"
Kurt's ears went pink. "Sebastian, why don't you just tell people that instead of playing this stupid game?"
Sebastian just shrugged. "What do you want me to tell you? Hi, I'm scared of gaining weight? Seriously? That's like the guy that's depressed having to remind people that he feels sad watching TV shows about suicide!"
To be fair, Blaine got depressed clothes shopping. Everything he tried on made him like a hobbit with a bad hair day. He couldn't even imagine how he'd feel like if he had an eating disorder and tried to try on a pair of pants.
Blaine didn't know what he was feeling. Maybe it was indigestion from the pepperoni. "Insulin? You're… a diabetic?"
"He used to be," Kurt replied. Blaine wondered how he didn't know this! "Lena told me when she came to visit."
"Yeah," Sebastian said in a whisper. "I was a sweet fucking kid! A vampire could have me for dessert."
Blaine remembered looking at the old photos of Sebastian in the BUMU Facebook group—wondering where he could find his features buried in more butter than a dozen croissants. He didn't have cheekbones, or a jawline. Sebastian. Seabass. Chin. Chin. Chin. Even his name implied he only had one chin, not five.
"Yeah," Mercedes shook her head. Blaine recalled the comparison post. "And we actually believed that you lost a hundred-and-something pounds in a flash without starving yourself? It's been a bad year. With all that time the BUMU Facebook page spent taking pictures of us in the Lima Bean, you'd think all that caffeine would've helped!"
"With all that sex-for-cardio? Maybe I could've lost it eating—…eating dick!" Sebastian smirked. "HA!"
Blaine tried to digest what was going on. Well, the part that didn't involve cloudy cock cocktails.
Diabetic? No wonder Sebastian had such a complex about being overweight! He probably freaked out and ran ten miles a day after eating out in the weekend, even before he developed his eating disorder. In no time, he probably went from looking like he was one step away from clogging all his coronaries to having less fat than an apple. And was there really a time where Blaine really believe that Sebastian Smythe managed to cut that much fat without trying to play with a double-edged knife? Besides, even before he got sick, Blaine was sure that a gust of wind could've carried him!
Blaine placed a hand on Sebastian's shoulder. Sebastian looked up at him, and he actually smiled. A real kind of smile that someone gave to someone that he actually saw as a friend. Or in Sebastian's case, a nice-looking piece of ass.
"Sebastian, uh…" Blaine didn't feel this nervous since he asked out that guy to Sadie Hawkins. "We're friends, right?"
"Everyone's my fucking friend," Sebastian just smirked. "With the amount of meds I'm on? I'm practically stoned."
Blaine almost felt the need to ask Sebastian if he took anything for the fact that he seemed as depressed as Eeyore. Well… if Eeyore went on a decade-old strict diet that made Christopher Robin's skinny knees look like heffalumps.
"Shut up, you're not," Blaine playfully pushed his shoulder. Sebastian winced, and Blaine hated himself forever now.
Sebastian was still smiling. It was nice to see him, you know, look normal. "I am too." He said. "I—"
"IthinkyoushouldgobacktoDalton," Kurt blurted out suddenly. "I think that it's better than you sitting here moping."
Sebastian looked at Kurt, looking like he was wondering if his excessive hairspray use finally killed off his brain cells.
"Are you serious?" Mercedes looked surprised. "I saw the Warblers the other day, and they were telling me they were suffocating under the pile of crap that they had to learn this week!"
Kurt sighed in exasperation. Blaine nibbled on the slice that he really didn't want. "Cedes, I really doubt they're going to be asking Sebastian to prepare a forty-slide presentation after he spent a month breathing out of a tube!"
"Depends," Sebastian smirked. "Is the forty-slide presentation about spending a month breathing out of a tube?"
Blaine doubted Sebastian remembered most of that. He was so out of that that when the doctors pricked him with a giant soul-sucking needle, he barely moved. In reference to their Michael matches, Michael Jackson himself would be deadly jealous about the amount of Propofol that Sebastian had been drugged with in the ICU.
"Ha ha," Kurt faked laughing. "Sebastian, go back to Dalton. Please. And stop watering Carole's weeds."
Blaine could not imagine Sebastian watering any weeds. Smoking some was another story!
"Fine," Sebastian replied, eating the last slice of his pizza. Pieces of roasted eggplant was falling everywhere. "But someone's got to drive me there and back because I'm not going to walk fifteen miles on crutches."
"Trent could probably drive you," Blaine mentioned softly. "Uh… you two should really work past that Dave issue."
"Fine," Sebastian said. He had the excitement of Puck at remaining celibate forever. "But it's his issue, not mine."
The funny thing was that that was exactly what Trent said about Sebastian! Blaine sighed deeply. Kurt told him that Dave and Trent were no longer an item, but he didn't want to tell Sebastian that. Like he wanted to start another Warbler feud between Sebastian and Trent. Blaine just didn't know why those two couldn't get along! But Blaine guessed that it was like trying to mix sweet, sweet, gentle water and highly combustible booze.
And because it was each other's each issue's and also simultaneously not each other's issues, Blaine found himself carpooling with Sebastian and Trent on his first day back to Dalton. Blaine skipped school to do this.
Most people that skipped school spent the day watching cartoons and eating soup, not trying to prevent a bird fight.
But Blaine was pleasantly surprised. Trent was quiet, and Sebastian didn't complain about Trent's car—much. Even though Sebastian drove a vehicle of death. Though even in his new Dalton uniform that showed off his very fashionable sunken cheeks and hollow eyes, Sebastian had to wrap himself in three layers of blankets because Trent's car was cold. If something was cold for Blaine, it might as well be sub-zero for Salad Supporter Sebastian.
Besides "hey", Trent hadn't really said anything. But five minutes after they started driving, they were at the stop-light near the Lima Bean. Trent looked over at Sebastian with a compassionate look to his face, "Do you want coffee?"
Sebastian shook his head, still buried under Grandma's Finest.
"You look sort of cold," Trent said. Sebastian did not look sort of cold. He looked like he was stiffer than a corpse in a coffin. Blaine was pretty sure that Sebastian now had permanent blue balls.
"Yeah," Sebastian nodded his head. Trent unzipped his blazer, and then offered it to him.
"Do you like hot chocolate?" Trent asked. Blaine wanted to tell him that Sebastian didn't eat liquid sugar in fear of having to amputate his foot off from complications of being a glutton mutton, but he didn't say anything.
"Yeah," Sebastian replied. "I like marshmallows," he also said.
Blaine didn't know what happened there. He thought that Sebastian might be lethally hypothermic, and he might require rescuitation before he went to Dalton. He also thought that maybe Sebastian just wanted to be nice to Trent. Was that possible? Did Sebastian sort of want to be nice to other people without wanting to use them?
"Okay," Trent drove over there after the stop-light went green. "I'll get one for you too, Blaine."
After parking in the near-empty parking lot, Trent got up from the car and walked to the Lima Bean. Sebastian was staring outside. He probably forgot how outside looked like since he'd been living under a rock the past month.
Blaine and Sebastian were the only ones in the car. Blaine looked back to see how blue Sebastian's ears were.
"That's pretty nice," Sebastian finally said, moving to place a hand on his knee. He looked like he was drawing in Trent's blazer, and Trent was not that big. "Too bad that I swapped his water for vodka."
Blaine rolled his eyes. "Sebastian!" he yelled, and swapped Trent's water bottle for his. "Are you serious?"
"What?" Sebastian rolled his eyes. "I didn't know he was going to be fucking nice to me! I thought he was going to fucking let me walk there on my crutches—I didn't know he was getting me fucking marshmallows!"
"You're unbelievable!" Blaine stuffed the water bottle in his bag. "People are trying to help you… not poison you!"
"I guess," Sebastian replied. Which was better than his usual backlash of how everyone could go suck his dick, because Dalton somehow ignored the fact that they didn't make running shorts in size I-only-eat-rice-cakes.
Blaine relaxed into his seat. "We're sorry about what happened to you," he said. "But it's no excuse to act like a dick."
"I am a dick," Sebastian replied. "You're not going to unearth a nice, sad victim out of me, Gaylord after all this is over. I'm still going to be the same fucking person whether you like it or not. So, get over it."
Trent returned, looking flushed with hot chocolates for pretty much everyone. A few sips of one hot chocolate later, Sebastian looked pinker. It just dawned on Blaine that this must be like the carrot cake frappuccino incident. Why would Sebastian feel faint anyway when Kurt confirmed that he saw him eat five buckwheat pancakes that morning?
"Are you nervous?" Blaine finally realised. He probably wanted the mallows to mellow out!
Sebastian rolled his shiny green eyes. "What do you think?" he replied acerbically. "The whole fucking school changed because they didn't know that my mother kicking me out of the fucking house. Everyone and their fucking grandmas probably want to ask me QUESTIONS. Questions that I should be charging ten dollars a pop for!"
Blaine was sure that this was Sebastian Speak for I don't wanna answer anyone's questions about my sensitive information.
Trent seemed to get that memo too. "Do… you wanna stay in my dorm?" Trent offered softly. "I don't have a roommate, and I still have some of your stuff from last time. If you don't wanna go to the first class."
"It's fucking calculus, isn't it?" Sebastian looked like he wanted to laugh. Trent went red. "Great!"
Blaine didn't know how Sebastian's luck turned out like that. He made a mental note to read Sebastian's horoscope just to see if the stars aligned to fuck him over. You know… when he found out when Sebastian's birthday was.
"There's a NEW counsellor in Dalton!" Trent suddenly remembered. "Uh… they probably want to see you first!"
"Great," Sebastian looked as inspired as Mike Chang was to sing. "I couldn't be anymore fucking ecstatic!"
Blaine's heart hammered into his chest when Trent neared Dalton. Usually, he felt a pang of nostalgia, but now, he was shocked. There were camera people there for once, surrounding everything like a virus causing an epidemic. Sebastian sunk into Trent's car the second that he saw some old lady in very colourful pantyhose (did people even wear those past the preteen years? Seriously?) whizzed past Trent's car. Her papers were flying everywhere.
"I know it's a little crowded," Trent said softly. Blaine was horrified. "But… uh… they're not in the classes. And they're only there to talk to teachers about the changes, since it's still a big thing. You just came out of the hospital like a few weeks ago, and there's the whole thing with your dad's trial. It's still big news, so that's why they're—"
"Takemehome," Sebastian blurted out all of a sudden. Bits of hot chocolate was spilling from his hand. "NOW!"
Blaine looked back to see Sebastian. He looked somewhere between a mix of terrified and pissed.
"It's going to be OKAY!" Trent squeaked out. "I'll be with you all day. Uh… really! I didn't even tell the Warblers yet, but if you want me to, we can hide you from the reporters! You won't have to talk to anyone!"
"Hide me? You want me to run away from them?!" Sebastian raised an eyebrow. "I'm in fucking CRUTCHES!"
Blaine sort of wished that he didn't swipe Trent's drink. But he also thought Sebastian needed to go to Dalton too.
"You can't stay home forever! It's not good for you!" Trent tried to encourage him. "THEY don't bite! I swear!"
"They ain't asking you about YOUR fucking family!" Sebastian spat back. He was sweating and panting heavily now. "They ain't going to be asking you about what you think about your father's STUPID FUCKING TRIAL!"
Sebastian collapsed back into the seat, powerless as Trent turned off the engine. He pocketed his keys away.
"This is for your own good," Trent said to him seriously. "I'm sorry, Sebastian."