When the a/c breaks down in their home, forcing Kurt, Sebastian, and Thomas out on the lawn, Sebastian embraces his privilege and makes a rash decision.

Notes: This takes place before the last two summer vacation fics.

"Spray me."

"Ooo," Sebastian growls, immediately reaching for the waistband of his board shorts, "that's a little more feral than you're usually into, but if you insist ..."

Kurt glares at his husband in open mouth disgust. "Wha-? Ugh! Gross!" He swings his arm to smack him, but with no energy, his arm drops limply to the grass. "If you can't behave, you're going to lose your squirt bottle privileges!"

"It's … so … hot!" Thomas moans, rolling his head back and forth in agony. "When is it going to stop being so hot?"

"When our government wises up, we quit our reliance on fossil fuels and stop ruining our atmosphere," Sebastian offers, spritzing his husband and son down with cold water from a plastic bottle by his side. He'd picked it up at the gas station on a whim in anticipation of the scorching hot weather - something they could carry with them when they took Hepburn out for walks to stay cool.

Little did he know what a life saver that dollar bottle would turn out to be when their central air conditioning crapped out on them that morning.

"What?" Thomas asks, not quite comprehending his father's explanation.

"It should cool down before the end of summer," Kurt translates.

"Well, you know what they say," Sebastian says, "it's not the heat …"

"Stop! Stop right there!"

"What?"

"If I hear another schmuck say it's not the heat, it's the humidity, I'm going to … I'm going to … punch a duck."

Sebastian snickers. His poor husband, too exhausted from the heat to properly snark.

"If we had a pool, we wouldn't be lying on the front lawn, melting," Sebastian points out, stirring up an argument that had started the day they found out a heat wave was coming. Sebastian was all for the idea – a nice, kidney shaped oasis in their backyard, where they could soak during the hot days … and have sex during the hot nights.

Kurt didn't like the idea at all. He didn't feel it was safe since Thomas didn't know how to swim yet. To that, Sebastian hopped on the Internet and showed Kurt the many gates a security systems they could install to keep Thomas away from the pool when they weren't around. Aside from that, Hepburn, who never leaves Thomas's side, wouldn't let his little boy drown in a million years. Kurt had to admit, safety might not be the issue he first thought, so he came up with another argument, one he clung to consistently.

"Pools lower property values," he says. "You know that."

"You know what lowers property values more?"

"What?"

"Three dead bodies."

"Four," Thomas corrects him. "You forgot Hepburn."

"Quite right," Sebastian says. He rolls his head from left to right, back to Kurt. "Four dead bodies."

Kurt flicks a hand at him. "Less talking, more spraying."

Sebastian raises the spray bottle in the air and gives it a shake. "I think the bottle's empty."

"Well, go refill it."

"Okay, Mr. Bossy," Sebastian grumbles. "I don't see why I have to refill it. I'm always refilling it …" He sticks his tongue out at his husband before he stumbles across the lawn towards the house, knees weak from over an hour of lying out on the grass. Even in the shade, it has to be close to a hundred degrees. He wobbles up the porch steps, trips to the front door, wraps a hand around the knob, and opens it. There he stands, staring into their dark house, as a wave of heat knocks him back a full five feet. He tosses the door shut, his face, his neck, all his exposed skin, covered in a massive sheen of sweat after that thermal assault.

"That's … not going to happen," he calls out, locking the house behind him.

"Wha-why not?"

"Because I'm not going into that sauna. Not without twenty ice packs taped to my body. I'd never come out alive."

"So, what do we do now?" Kurt whines. "The repair guy said he can't come until tomorrow."

Sebastian puts his hands on his hips and looks around, back at their house, their haven, their shelter, then down at his family, baking to a crisp at barely ten in the morning. The afternoon is going to get hotter, they're going to swelter, then spend the evening sleeping in tents on the front lawn, and it won't be any cooler.

Sebastian can handle cold. He can always make himself warmer. But he can't handle intense heat.

"Nope. Nope. I'm not doing this. We're getting out of here."

"Where? We're already out of the house."

Sebastian runs through their options in his head. When they couldn't get the a/c up and running, he'd considered taking them to a hotel nearby. But there's some combination of boat show/car race/Founder's Day celebration that has most of the local places booked. If they go a little bit out of state, where will they end up? West Virginia? Maryland? Pennsylvania?

No. Not Pennsylvania! Kurt will have them hitting every quilt show in Amish Country. And if they head to the city, Kurt will use it as an excuse to work.

Fuck it. They have a vacation planned. No reason they can't start early.

"California."

"What?" Kurt asks, but Thomas gets his second wind, leaping to his feet (albeit slower than usual) and heading to his father's SUV the second he hears Sebastian chirp the lock. "What do you mean?"

Sebastian offers Kurt a hand up. "We're heading to the airport. We're going to Disney early. Wes and Trent both have a key to our place. They can let the a/c guy in when he gets here. They owe me a favor … or seven."

"But … our tickets aren't valid until next week!"

"I'll buy new tickets. Sheesh."

"But we haven't packed any of our things!"

"We'll buy new things, Kurt. And when we get back … we're getting that pool."

"Yay!" Thomas cheers, buckling himself into his seat.

"Don't I get a say in this?" Kurt asks. He really has no objection. Sebastian is right. They should have gotten the damned pool. And he's right now. He just doesn't feel like admitting it.

It's too hot.

"Of course you get a say. You said no. I say yes."

"I say yes!" Thomas adds, kicking his feet.

"There you go. Majority rules." He opens the passenger door for his husband.

"You don't think you're over reacting just a teeny tiny bit," Kurt teases.

"Kurt, we're suffering," Sebastian says, buckling Kurt into his seat. "Why are we suffering? We don't have to suffer. We're rich."